Connections to Wonder #566 "Why Is It So Fun To Monkey Around?"

This morning as I read through the Wonder of the Day, Why Is It So Fun To Monkey Around.   I immediately had two connections to the Wonder.

First, I thought of the perfect picture book to go with the Wonder.  The Wonder mentioned Jane Goodall because of her work with chimpanzees.  Earlier this year I read the picture book, Me... Jane by Patrick McDonnell to my class.  When we read the book, I remembered thinking this is a great book to encourage readers to  Wonder.  

The book describes Jane Goodall as a child and all the exploring and wondering Jane did with her stuffed chimpanzee.  These adventures are what later led her to do her research with chimpanzees.  One page describes some of the wondering and exploring she did, "One day, curious Jane wondered where eggs came from.  So she and Jubilee snuck into Grandma Nutt's chicken coop....."

The simple text makes this picture book an easy read aloud for children of any age group.  The book can be used to encourage Wonder, as an introduction to biographies, to teach children about the love of nature, following your dreams, details in illustrations and many other ways.  I can't wait to see how many of my students checked out the Wonder today and see if they connect it to Me... Jane on Monday.  I am also excited to pull this book out and revisit it again.

My second connection to the Wonder of the Day was to the "monkeying around" part.  As I have mentioned before, as part of being chosen to be part of the Wonder Year Adventure 2012, my family got to go on a WONDERful adventure to Louisville, Kentucky over New Year's.  One of our stops on our adventure was to the Louisville Zoo.  While at the zoo we got to meet some of their orangutans.  One of the orangutans, Bella, enjoyed showing off for us and "monkeying around."  Bella had me take everything out of my purse and then pointed to have someone else in our group do the same thing.  We were quite entertained by all of Bella's "monkey business."

The video below was recorded by my 10 year old daughter who you can hear and tell laughed throughout Bella's antics.