Grandfather Tang's Story (Dragonfly Books)

Engaging story. Simple but wonderful lesson. Buying some physical tangrams to read with this book will make it even better.

I bought this book previously and somehow misplaced it so I bought it again. This book is a great teacher read aloud during math while the students have Tangrams and try to make the shapes as you read the book. I use it in fourth grade. My students love Tangrams and they love this story.

I read this story as a kid and now I read it to my students. They build the shapes along with the story on tangram mats. As we go, the mats have more and more lines erased. They’ve loved it each year :)

As a second grade teacher, my class loved this book. I have a set of tan grams for each student and they loved trying to make each as I read it. Great thinking and conversations going on!!

This is a playful story that gets its audience thinking in multiple ways. I added laminated tangram pieces to it so that the characters can be made by a pair of readers while enjoying the story.

Grandfather Tang’s Story: A Tale Told in Tangrams by Ann Tompert and illustrated by Robert Andrew Parker is a unique book which uses tangrams–the traditional Chinese art form– to expand the lovely pastel illustrations. The plot line features a sweet moment between granddaughter and her grandfather. The little girl requests her grandfather to tell a story so that they can both bring it to life with their tangrams. Readers can easily duplicate the tangram shapes and then mimic each illustration themselves which offers a unique interactive element to the story. Or, they can simply enjoy the illustrations without taking on the challenge–and fun–of manipulating the tangram pieces.This story offers a good example of families connecting across generations, creating fun from their imaginations — without depending on elaborate tech. It highlights a subtle message of loyalty, friendship and learning from mistakes.AQ* Lens This tale can easily digress into a conversation about the many ways we try to change ourselves, something many adoptees struggle with as they try to figure out how to fit in. Readers can discuss how each transformation brought risks and rewards; most importantly the foxes recognize they must be true to themselves. This is such an important lesson for all of us but especially for many adoptees who are tempted to reshape themselves to fit their idea of what they believe their parents “wish” them to be.The story also shows how the little girl “read” the cues her grandfather gave so she recognized when he needed to end their game and rest. This plot points can leading to talking about reading social cues which is an important skill that all kids need. --Gayle H. Swift, "ABC Adoption & Me: A Multicultural Picture Book"

I love children's literature. The story is great for all ages. Book has nice pictures, warm messages, and terrific potential for activities.

It did not work well for my 1st graders. But would have been fun for an older group.

Book was in great condition, very useful to introduce 2D shapes.

Es una delicia para ir siguiendo con un tangram, y para continuar la historia con nuevos personajes. Nos ha gustado muchísimo.

I read this with my 4 year old and 6 year old today, we have a large wooden tangram puzzle that we used to create the tangram pictures along the way in the story. They loved getting the puzzle worked out so we could carry on with the story, which was fun and had a lovely ending. We home educate in the Charlotte Mason style which uses narrative to convey facts and truths, this fits in really well with our other work and has been a great introduction to our study of shapes and basic geometry. I would recommend it for ages 4 to 8.

A very nice introduction to using Tangram. Especially introducing it to grandchildren and making the shapes together.