Saturday, November 19, 2011

Uhu by Annette Macarthur-Onslow

This is one of the first books I purchased for use in the classroom when I started teaching in 1985. The book itself was first published in 1969 and it is still a very accessible text for todays' students. It won the Book of the Year Award in 1970. This book records a family's efforts to raise a baby owl to maturity.

For Uhu it was bound to be trouble from the start. He was one of the inquisitive ones who must tempt providence. There he was on the ground, having fallen out of the nest in his pine tree...a defiant white ball of fluff with enormous blackcurrant eyes and tiny beak clicking a warning to anyone daring to enter his territory among the roots and pine needles. For a creature born to inherit the forest this was all most humiliating. No doubt if I had not come along, a fox would have found him and made a hasty meal.

The language is very descriptive with challenging vocabulary, but entirely suitable to a capable upper primary reader.

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