Friends Forever— or Snack Time?

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Book Summary Nugget the minnow and Fang the shark are unlikely pals, but they don’t let that get in the way of having a blast together. They are inseparable friends who spend every minute enjoying each other’s company . . . that is, until Nugget starts school with the other minnows. No matter the subject, Nugget and his classmates are taught to be-ware of those huge, toothy, scary sharks. At first Nugget is skeptical—he knows Fang, and Fang isn’t scary! But he soon begins to wonder if his old friend may indeed be the ferocious predator his teachers and new friends describe. When Nugget explains to Fang that minnows and sharks aren’t supposed to be friends, he is crestfallen. He does everything he can to show Nugget that he’s the same goofy, friendly guy he’s always been. But Nugget’s new friends are suspicious—so Fang ends up all alone. When he happens to witness Nugget and his classmates swept up in the clutches of a fishing net, he gets his chance. Those big teeth are just the thing—he tears through the net, freeing Nugget and the rest. Nugget and the others realize that friends come in all shapes and sizes, and Fang is never lonely again!

Note to TeachersNugget & Fang is a story about getting along. It’s about getting to know and appre-ciate all different kinds of people. It’s about being kind to your friends even when others are not being kind. It’s about tolerance. This book fits perfectly into any anti-bullying curriculum, or as part of a series of read-aloud books focused on teaching tolerance and community building. It’s also great to have on hand as specific situa-tions come up in your classroom, to remind children that when everyone is included and celebrated, everyone benefits.

Discussion Questions for Read-Aloud• Fang and Nugget are not much alike on the outside—but they are still the best

of friends. Why do you think they get along so well?• Do you have friends who are very different from you? What about being dif-

ferent makes your friendship special?• Nugget doesn’t even question having Fang as a friend until Fang goes to

school and begins to learn how “scary” sharks are. Do you think Nugget would have become scared of Fang if the other fish hadn’t been scared of sharks? Why or why not?

• How could Nugget have behaved differently? Did he have to listen to the other fish? Why didn’t he stand up for his friend? Have you ever felt like that?

• The little fish are scared of Fang because he is different. Have you experienced anything like this in your life? Why do you think people are sometimes scared of one another’s differences?

• What does Fang do to try to show Nugget that he’s friendly? Why don’t those things work?

• Fang is really creative when coming up with ideas of nice things to do for Nugget. What kinds of things do you do when you are trying to show someone you care about him or her?

• What changes the minnows’ minds about Fang? • What do you think the minnows will do if they ever meet another shark, now

that they are friends with Fang?

Teaching Ideas• Reading/Writing: Nugget & Fang incorporates snippets of dialogue into the

story. You might discuss how the dialogue—the conversations and exclama-tions—adds to the story. You might ask students to go on a hunt through your classroom library to see if they can find other books that work this way, and study the ways the dialogue and the story line work together. You might even have students write and draw their own stories, incorporating bits of dia-logue in the form of speech bubbles (see lesson below).

• Reading/Writing: In Nugget & Fang, the pictures speak volumes. You might discuss how the illustrator uses the pictures—particularly the expressions on the characters’ faces—to add to the story. What do we learn about the min-nows’ feelings about Fang from their reactions to his dinner invitation? When your students are reading (or making) picture books, you might encourage them to think about how pictures can reveal a lot about how characters are feeling.

• Math: There are a few addition problems woven through the text—for ex-ample, 10 minnows + 1 shark = 11 friends. Using the pictures in the book as source material, invite your students to write and solve sea-life story prob-lems. Simple addition and subtraction problems work best.

• Science: In minnow school, the little fish study the marine food chain. Al-though Nugget and Fang are unlikely friends (because they are on the oppo-site ends of the food chain), the book can provide a nice addition to a study of the marine food chain. Perhaps studying the real food chain will help young-sters empathize with the minnows’ initial mistrust of Fang!

• Social Studies/Community Building: It is often the case that people, unlike Nugget and Fang, gravitate toward those who are most like themselves. How-ever, sometimes all it takes to broaden our horizons is an invitation. Invite your students to sit next to someone in the class they don’t usually talk to, and to learn one new thing about that person. Afterward, have students introduce each other and share the new facts they’ve learned about their classmates.

A Writing Lesson: Incorporating Meaningful Dialogue as Speech Bubbles in Picture Books (K–2)

Materials Needed: A copy of Nugget & Fang; writing and drawing materials for stu-dents. Access to a document camera so that you can project the pages of the book is helpful but not necessary. You may wish to write your own story and use a page from it in this exercise as an example. Your story should match the level of your students’ writing in terms of amount and complexity of text.

Background Knowledge: It will be helpful if your students are already familiar with the book Nugget & Fang. You will want to have read it to them and discussed it on several occasions. This lesson works well within the context of a unit of study focus-ing on writing narratives—either personal narratives or fictional narratives—in which students are supporting their writing with drawings, and vice versa. However, you may choose to do it anytime you wish to introduce your students to the concept of dialogue and invite them to try it out in their own writing.

Introduction and Teaching: Tell your students that often, writers of picture books tell more of the story by writing what characters say to one another, otherwise known as dialogue. You might explain that sometimes writers put the dialogue right in with the other words, or narrative, but sometimes they put it in the characters’ pictures, or speech bubbles, as in Nugget & Fang. Looking at a page or two of Nugget & Fang (using the document camera if you choose), ask students to discuss the dialogue the author has added in speech bubbles and how it tells more of the story. Then show students your sample story—it helps if it is about a shared experience—and ask them to help you think of some dialogue that you could add in speech bubbles that makes your story stronger. Ask each student to talk to one other student to gen-erate ideas, and then add speech bubbles to your story sample using students’ ideas. Then invite students to try it out in their own stories.

Work Time: As your students work, circulate among them, offering help and sugges-tions as necessary. Students of all ages generally have a lot of energy for this work—it is very motivating. Adding speech bubbles sometimes provides a nice entryway into adding words to stories for students who struggle or are less interested in writ-ing. But all students will benefit from this work. You may find that some need remind-ers to keep their dialogue tied in to the rest of the story, to make sure that it is mean-ingful. It can be helpful to carry a copy of Nugget & Fang with you as you circulate, so that you have it on hand as an example for students who get stuck.

Share: Gather your students together in the class meeting place with their writing, and invite them to share it with a neighbor or a small group of classmates. You may decide to ask a student or two who felt particularly successful with adding speech bubbles to share their writing with the class. You might invite students to discuss how the added dialogue enhanced the story.

Guide written by Zoe Ryder White

A Guide for Discussion and Classroom Use

hmhbooks.com/nuggetandfang

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