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The truth is I forgot to pick up a book from my bus on Saturday (it unfortunately doesn’t live with me!) so I am writing a blog today on a story I know off by heart!! It is about a rabbit, not a wolf for a change; oops, sorry, there is actually briefly a wolf in it!! This lovely lady at Keswick School on Saturday was a fan of this story so I thought I’d share it in case some of you aren’t familiar with it yet!

Language of text: French
Type of text: picture book
Author or source: Stephanie Blake
Intended age of students: Key Stage 1/2
Source reference: Ecole des loisirs

Approaches:

This story is hilarious and the one which stands out for me as perfect to get children to join in… Children and adults alike have always LOVED it when I have read it! I have only ever used it as a one-off treat story but there is so much more you could do with it!
It is the story of a rabbit who only ever says “caca boudin” to anything… until he gets eaten by a wolf!! That is only part of the story though!

Rationale:
As well as being a fun story in French, it gets children to think about language which is appropriate (or not!) in certain situations and how it can affect an outcome.

Outcomes:
They will enjoy listening to this story as a treat, they will love joining in (everyone can, it is so easy), they will want to predict what happens next. It generally is a happy story with a couple of twists in it! You will all enjoy discussing what happens in the story and reminding each other about it regularly… Your children will never ever forget the phrase”caca boudin”!!

Topics or themes:
Daily routine

Grammar:
The imperfect tense; extended sentences with “quand” and “qui”

How much time required:
From 10 minutes to as much as you want!

I have now met Stephanie Blake 3 times… lucky me! There are still not many resources to go with “Caca boudin” but I love those here, all about rabbits too. If you like this story there are plenty more books with the cheeky Simon in them which have been exploited widely… read about some of them here!

A digital (and audio) version of the book is available on the Culturethèque website (UK only) by clicking here.

Do you like Simon? Have you seen him on the television? A child on the bus once told me he knew him from a cartoon… and he was right!!