One of the most exciting parts of writing a book for children is seeing all of the ways it is used by students, families, and teachers. I got one email from a parent telling me that she used Pedro’s Whale to teach her children about their brother with autism. At one of my workshops, a principal told me that he used Pedro to teach his staff about supporting individual differences.

A few teachers have told me that they used the book to give their paraprofessionals ideas for providing appropriate supports in inclusive classrooms. I love all of these stories and feel especially satisfied when people tell me that they were able to use the teaching ideas in Pedro’s Whale to create these lessons as we had always hoped the book would be used as a tool for learning.

So far, those brief back-of-the-book ideas have been the only thing I could offer teachers looking for lesson ideas for Pedro’s Whale, so I was so thrilled to get an email from Lynne Dudas, letting me know about her graduate school project involving our book. Lynne created materials to help students in elementary grades learn about characteristics of classmates with autism using The Common Core Standards in literacy, Pedro’s Whale, and other books. You can get her plans over on the Teachers Pay Teachers website (a great virtual store that allows educators to sell curriculum materials to other educators)

Have you used Pedro’s Whale to teach children about individual differences? Have you ever used it to teach other audiences? Other topics? I would love to hear your ideas and suggestions!