Sunday, April 4, 2010

The Magic Finger



The Magic Finger
by Roald Dahl
[Fantasy]

This story is told from the perspective of an eight-year-old girl who lives next door to the Gregg Family. The Gregg Family loves to hunt ducks, but the girls next door is less than amused by hunting and by the Gregg Family. The girl has a magic finger which punishes people when she points at them, but she has no control over this finger or when it is used. One day, she becomes so annoyed with the Gregg Family shooting ducks that she points her magic finger at them. The Gregg's wake up the next morning as tiny duck people with wings as arms, and there are four large ducks with arms instead of wings who have taken over their house. The Greggs must leave their house and build a nest in their yard to sleep in. When they wake up, they see the four large ducks standing under their nest with the Gregg's guns in hand. The ducks threaten to shoot them, since they seem to enjoy shooting ducks so much. The Gregg's promised the ducks that they would not shoot them anymore, so they are turned back into humans. The next day, the girl sees the Gregg's destroying their guns and making graves for the ducks that they have killed. The Gregg's have changed their name to Egg. Although the girls thinks it went a little too far, she is pleased. She then hears a gun shot from the Gregg's other neighbors, the Coopers. This made the girl furious, so she set off to change them into ducks and make them sleep in a nest for the night.

This is a good book to incorporate in upper grade literacy. It is good reading practice and is a funny, imaginative story. Students could read this book and discuss the literary components within. They could then write a summary about it and put the summary into wordle.

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