Jumanji

Author & Illustrator:   Chris Van Allsburg
Publisher:  Houghton Mifflin
Publication Year:   1981
Location: Personal collection

Awards:   Caldecott Medal

Summary:  This is the story of a bored brother and sister who play a board game called Jumanji. The board game comes to life and brings too much adventure and excitement, in the form of danger, into the lives. Once they finish the game, everything goes back to normal and they quickly try to get rid of the game. In the end, the kids return the board game and watch some neighbors of theirs take it.

Classroom Ideas: There is a movie based on this book that could be compared and contrasted. There is also a sequel called Zathura. I used these two books in my classroom to talk about circular plots and sequencing.