Literature Unit Study for Mouse Soup by Arnold Lobel

This post is part of the 31 MORE Days of Literature Unit Studies series. You can find all of the links to the thirty-one studies in this post. If you’d like to use these ideas to create your own unit study, this post has step-by-step instructions as well as a free unit study planner. (Want to know more about what, exactly, a unit study is? This post will help.)

While you’re reading and working on your unit study, you can dowload this free printables pack of graphic organizers for reading. It has a plot chart, venn diagram, KWL chart, two mini book report organizers, a character analysis chart, a plot outline chart, and a reading response sheet where students can record facts while reading.

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Arnold Lobel is the author of some of my very favorite early reader books. One of these is Mouse Soup. It’s the story of a witty mouse who’s coming up with a way to get away from the weasel who wants him for dinner.

Book Information

Title– Mouse Soup

Author- Arnold Lobel

Recommended ages-Kindergarten and early elementary

Synopsis- One day a mouse is sitting under a tree reading when he’s caught by a weasel. The weasel is determined to have the mouse for supper. But the mouse is pretty smart. He convinces the weasel that the soup will taste better with stories in it. So he proceeds to tell the weasel four stories.

After the mouse’s creative stories, the weasel is convinced that he should indeed add them to his soup. But when he heads out to get the ingredients the mouse has listed, things don’t go exactly the way he has planned.

Language Arts

Creative writing- Mouse comes up with four stories to tell the weasel. If you had to think of a story to tell weasel, what would it be about? Have kids write their story. Younger kids can dictate or illustrate a story.

Making predictions- When weasel first catches mouse at the beginning of the story, have kids make predictions about what will happen. Write down their predictions and compare them to the actual ending of the story.

Character analysis- Mouse is definitely an interesting character. Use the character analysis worksheet in the printable pack from above to write down some facts about Mouse.

Sequencing– At the end of Mouse’s story telling, he tells the weasel to collect five things. Draw five boxes on a blank sheet of paper and number them 1-5. Have kids illustrate, in order, the five things that the weasel did.

Science and Math

Bees- In Mouse’s first story, he talks about a hive of bees. Watch this video to learn more about bees.

Bees- This site has information about bees as well as pictures and information about planting a bee friendly garden.

Bees– National Geographic Kids has ten facts about bees as well as some cool photos.

Crickets- One of Mouse’s stories is about crickets. Learn about crickets from this site.

Crickets- This site has some fun activities you and your kids can do outside to learn more about crickets.

Rocks/critical thinking– After reading Mouse’s story about the rocks, have kids talk about why what the rocks saw was different after 100 years.

Crafts and Fun

Make your own mouse with these instructions.

After reading Mouse’s story about the bees, make this beehive craft.

After you read Mouse’s story about the chirping crickets, you can make your chirping crickets with these instructions.

Print a blank book and make your own illustrations for each of Mouse’s stories.

After reading Mouse Soup, make some soup with the kids. This site has six kid-approved soup recipes.

Booklist

Other books by Arnold Lobel

The Life and Times of the Honeybee (bees)

Are You a Bee? (bees)

Flight of the Honeybee (bees)

The Honey Makers (bees)

Bugs A-Z (crickets and bees)

The Bug Book (crickets and bees)

The Best Book of Bugs (crickets and bees)

Let’s Go Rock Collecting (rocks)

Rocks: Hard, Soft, Smooth, and Rough (rocks)

If You Find a Rock (rocks)

Other Resources

This Mouse Soup lesson plan has some good discussion questions to use when reading the book.

Homeschool Share has a free honey bees lapbook.

This is a brief biography of Arnold Lobel as well as a list of some of his books.

This is a fun video version of Mouse Soup.

Don’t miss the other literature units in this series!