The Emerald Forest

 

Catherine Ward, illus Karen Littlewood,
Otter Barry
Age 5-7 years

The beauty and richness of the Sumatran rainforest is brought to life in this stunningly illustrated picturebook. Focusing in particular on a family of orangutans we discover not only the beauty of their environment but also the threat wildlife is under when loggers arrive to cut down the trees destroying their forest home, and they have to leave. Fortunately, they find help from kind humans trying to save the forest and a new home where they can live safely.

Share the story

Read the story aloud
▪︎Read the story aloud to your child, pausing to talk about what is happening in the story and pictures if your child wants to.

▪︎Look though the book again, without reading the story looking closely at the pictures and talking about them

▪︎Encourage your child to tell the story,  using the pictures to help them do so.

Talk about the story
▪︎Share your favourite illustrations and lines from the story eg  ‘the forest was bursting with life’
▪︎Talk together about what you know about endangered animals.
▪︎Talk about shades of green including ‘emerald’ described in the story
Talk about how the orangutans might feel at different points in the story.

Things to make and do

Listen to the sounds of the rainforest in Sumatra and Borneo

Make your own sound effects for the story
See if you can find ways to make sounds of the rainforest from simple percussion instruments as you read the story. You could also try to make sounds of the machines which cut down the forest. Make recordings of your sound effects. Now try reading or telling the first few pages of the book with a recording of your sound effects in the background.

Make a small world rain forest
Use a large tray using leaves and moss, sticks and twigs. Add plastic animals that live
in Sumatra and re-enact the lives of the animals before the destruction begins.

Introduce model trucks and diggers and begin to dismantle the rain forest. Where
will all the animals go?

Make a book
Make an information book about the animals which live in the Sumatran Rainforest (use the links below to find out more)

Make a picture
Make a large background painting or collage of the rainforest. On separate paper draw some of the animals which live there cut them out and stick them on.

Visit a zoo
Visit a zoo and sketch the orangutans as they play and move around in their enclosure.

Find out more

▪︎ Look at maps or globes to find Sumatra. See what you can find out about Sumatra together.

▪︎Find out more about animals living in Sumatra

▪︎Find out more about the Bukit Tigapuluh National Park and its work.

▪︎Find out more about palm oil production.

▪︎Read another story about Orangutans in danger

▪︎Adopt an orangutan