Book Review: Meet the Barkers: Morgan and Moffat Go to School | By: Committee for Children by Tomie dePaola Reading Level: Preschool–Grade 2 The first week of school for the Barker twins is very exciting. Moffie earns a lot of gold stars for knowing all the right answers. And Morgie makes two new friends with a common interest in dinosaurs. By the end of the week, though, their teacher has a little talk with Moffie about giving other people a chance to speak in class. When she suggests that Moffie “run along and play with your friends,” Moffie realizes she’s been too busy accumulating gold stars to make any friends. Even when she has an opportunity to play with Sally, she turns the play time into competition. Morgie comes along in the nick of time, when both girls are scowling over the fact that they each want to build the tallest tower. “Why don’t you use all the blocks for one tower?” Morgie offers. “You can build a really tall tower together.” With her brother’s gentle guidance, Moffie finds a friend in Sally … meanwhile, Morgie finally earns himself a gold star thanks to his dinosaur expertise. Social and Emotional Lessons in Meet the Barkers Author-illustrator Tomie dePaola takes on some very real issues of young children in this first in his series about the lovable Barker dog twins. In an era when children are under tremendous pressure to achieve academic success, many of the very qualities that can lead to this success and to broader success in life slip off the radar. The twins are lucky enough to realize early in their school life that social-emotional skills are as important as academic proficiency. The friendship skills that Morgie exhibits—making conversation, sharing, joining in with play—are reflected in the Second Step program, which builds social-emotional and self-regulation skills. These skills have been shown to contribute to academic success (PDF). Teachers, label a big piece of paper “I Saw That.” On the chart, write these Second Step program concepts: Playing together, trading, and taking turns are fair and fun ways to play. Choosing to have fun with others rather than get your own way helps you be friends. Inviting others to play is a way to make friends. Noticing what other children are playing and offering ideas for play helps you join in. Thinking about how others want to be treated and treating them that way helps you be respectful. Being respectful helps you be a better learner. Add other concepts as appropriate. Discuss with students how Morgie demonstrates each of these concepts in the story (sharing his book, helping Moffie and Sally come up with a solution to their problem, inviting Billy and Bobby to play, etc.). Provide a box of gold stars (or a gold marker) next to the chart. Throughout the year, ask students to put a gold star next to any of the concepts they “catch” others practicing. (You can catch students, too!) Every few days, or whenever there’s an accumulation of stars, ask children to share the star-worthy actions they’ve witnessed.