Summer Book Finds - Arthur Writes a Story

There's hardly anything that I like as much as books.  Any other teachers out there feel the same way?
When I go to visit my parents on Vancouver Island my mum and I always do one of her favourite things:  go to second-hand stores.  At 84 she can still outshop me any day of the year!  There is a new ValuVillage there and it is usually the first place we head for.  She keeps me interested in going up and down the aisles for a while - you never know what good stuff you can get in the stationary section or housewares, but eventually I give her the slip and sneak off to the books.
Kids books are usually $1.49 each (although sometimes they're 99 cents), but if you buy 4 you get a 5th for free.  I generally stock up for my class, and this year they had shelves and shelves and shelves of picture books.
Here's what I got:

I was particularly pleased to get the two Robert Munsch books because my kiddos love listening him to read them during our morning Language Arts time.  I have lots of Munsch books, but not these two.
I blogged about how we do Listen to Reading in my class here.  There's a two page freebie of the sheets that I have the kids fill out when they're finished listening.  The first sheet is for making connection, and the second is a book recommendation.  You can grab them here.
I love to use Arthur Writes a Story with my class, so I was very pleased to get it - in hardcover, too!  Usually I borrow it from the library.
In the book Arthur's teacher asks them to write a story for homework.  The topic is "Something that is important to you".
Arthur goes home and quickly writes "How I Got My Puppy Pal".

He shares it with DW who tells him it is boring.  She suggests that getting an elephant would be more exciting.  So Arthur rewrites his story using elephants instead, but then is influenced by his friends who have written about outer space, that include scientific research, jokes, and songs.  Arthur attempts to introduce all these to his story, which becomes rambling and confusing.

After he performs it for his family and his class he finally reverts to his original version, which meets with approval by all.

I use this story in my classroom as an example of how simple stories that tell about ONE thing that you know about are the best.