Henry and Mudge - Connections with the Text

Making connections is a very important skill to acquire and perfect. Henry and Mudge: The First Book is a great story for students to connect on many different levels. In this activity, students will be making text to text, text to self, and text to world connections. Students should choose which connection they want to make first and work to write a narrative for that. Once all three connections have been made, students can work on their illustrations.

TEXT TO TEXT

• Text: In Henry and Mudge: The First Book, Mudge likes to smell everything. "He smelled his lemon hair. He smelled his milky mouth. He smelled his soapy ears. He smelled his chocolate fingers."
• Text: In Henry and Mudge: The Starry Night, Mudge likes to smell. "Mudge loved to hike and smell. He smelled a raccoon from yesterday. He smelled a deer from last night. He smelled an oatmeal cookie from Henry's back pocket.”

TEXT TO SELF

• Text: Mudge likes Henry's bed. He likes to climb in with him. "But mostly he loved Henry's bed. Because in Henry's bed was Henry. Mudge loved to climb in with Henry. Then he loved to smell him."
• Self: My cat Hazel loves to cuddle with me in my bed.

TEXT TO WORLD

• Text: Mudge gets lost. Henry is very sad and looks for him. Finally, they are reunited.
• World: On the news there was a story about a young boy who was reunited with his dog after it was missing for a whole year.

Student Instructions

Create a storyboard that shows connections you have made with Henry and Mudge. Include a connection for text to text, text to world, and text to self.

1. Click "Start Assignment".
2. Identify parts of Henry and Mudge that you connect with.
3. Parts from Henry and Mudge go on the left side. The connections you make go on the right side.
4. Create an image for each connection using scenes, characters, items, and text boxes.
5. Write a description of how the text relates to another text, the world, and you.