You Wouldn't Want to...

It's rare that I get excited about a series of picture books, but kudos to the small army of writers who produced the "You Wouldn't Want to..." series of nonfiction books. It seems that the series was started was British author David Salariya and has since been taken on by several other writers, although most of the titles are illustrated by the extremely talented David Antram.

The Manchester Evening News called this series "a fascinating full-on colour weapon in the battle to get kids to remember historical facts." I think they're even more important as tools to help kids even care about history. Antram's lively, hysterical cartoons (very reminiscent of Mad magazine) give the text a comic book feel, and every page is packed with well-researched facts, organized with headings, subheadings, and captions which will help students better understand the organizational conventions of traditional textbooks.

You Wouldn't Want to Be a Worker on the Statue of Liberty! was the first that I read, but not nearly the last. I also immensely enjoyed You Wouldn't Want to Be a Greek Athlete!, a humorous look at the rough and tumble world of Ancient Athens and the first Olympic games.

The title list that appears at the bottom of this post comes from FunSchooling.net, an incredible source of ideas and inspirations for homeschoolers, teachers, and anyone else looking to spark the imagination of children. It illustrates the wide scope of the series, and you should make the jump to FunSchooling where you can get an even better look at the titles (those titles below that are linked to Amazon are the books I've personally read; give me a week or two to get to the rest).

So how to use these in the classroom?

• This series is simply excellent as a means to motivate reluctant readers, The vibrant, funny illustrations and the bite-sized chunks of text are certainly less intimidating than standard texts containing the same information. Boys especially seem to enjoy the humor and at times disgusting and gory historical factoids. Trust me, these are the books that cause all those whispers during Quiet Reading Time (and that's a good thing).
• Teachers seeking to place short stories or novels into a historical context will appreciate these books as schema builders. Students who understand the cutoms and beliefs of a particular culture and time and naturally more likely to understand events that unfold in that time. Students may even discover historical inaccuracies in the fiction books they read!
• Homeschooling parents in particular may wish to paint a broad picture of world history before drilling down deep in a particular era. An understanding of world history, both ancient and modern, will help students to make connections between the past and present.

You Wouldn't Want to Be a Mammoth Hunter!(c. 10,000BC)
You Wouldn't Want To Be A Sumerian Slave (c. 5000-2000BC)
You Wouldn't Want To Be An Egyptian Mummy! (c. 3000BC)
You Wouldn't Want To Be A Pyramid Builder! (c. 2500BC)
You Wouldn't Want To Be An Assyrian Soldier (c. 2000-600BC)
You Wouldn't Want To Be A Slave In Ancient Greece! (c. 1100 - 150BC)
You Wouldn't Want To Work On The Great Wall of China! (500-200BC)
You Wouldn't Want to Be a Roman Soldier!(400BC)
You Wouldn't Want To Be In Alexander The Great's Army! (336-323BC)
You Wouldn't Want To Be A Roman Gladiator! (c. 260BC)
You Wouldn't Want To Be Cleopatra (69-30BC)
You Wouldn't Want To Be A Viking Explorer! (c. 1000)
You Wouldn't Want To Be A Crusader! (1095-1099)
You Wouldn't Want To Live In A Medieval Castle! (c. 1200s?)
You Wouldn't Want to Be a Medieval Knight!(c. 1200s?)
You Wouldn't Want To Be In A Medieval Dungeon! (c. 1200s?)
You Wouldn't Want To Be In The Forbidden City! (built 1406-1420)
You Wouldn't Want To Be Married To Henry VIII! (1491 - 1547)
You Wouldn't Want To Be Ill In The 16th Century/ Tudor Times! (1500s)
You Wouldn't Want To Be Mary, Queen Of Scots! (1542-1587)
You Wouldn't Want To Sail In The Spanish Armada! (1588)
You Wouldn't Want To Be A Pirate's Prisoner! (1660s?)
You Wouldn't Want To Be An 18th-Century British Convict!
You Wouldn't Want To Travel With Captain Cook! (1760s)
You Wouldn't Want To Be An Aristocrat In The French
Revolution! (1789-1799)
You Wouldn't Want To Be A 19th-Century Coal Miner in England!
You Wouldn't Want To Sail On An Irish Famine Ship! (19th Century)
You Wouldn't Want to Be a Suffragist!(19th Century)
You Wouldn't Want To Be A Victorian Schoolchild! (1880s)
You Wouldn't Want To Be A Victorian Miner! (1880s)
You Wouldn't Want To Be A Victorian Servant! (1880s)
You Wouldn't Want to Be A Victorian Mill Worker! (1880s)
You Wouldn't Want To Live In Pompeii! (AD79)
You Wouldn't Want To Be A Mayan Soothsayer! (AD250-900)
You Wouldn't Want To Be An Aztec Sacrifice! (c. 1200s)
You Wouldn't Want To Be An Inca Mummy! (c. 1450)
You Wouldn't Want to Sail With Christopher Columbus!(1492)
You Wouldn't Want to Explore With Sir Francis Drake! (1570s)
You Wouldn't Want To Be An American Colonist! (1585)
You Wouldn't Want To Sail On The Mayflower! (1620)
You Wouldn't Want to Be at the Boston Tea Party!(1773)
You Wouldn't Want To Be An American Pioneer (18th Century)
You Wouldn't Want To Be In The First Submarine! (19th Century)
You Wouldn't Want Sail On A 19th-Century Whaling Ship!
You Wouldn't Want to Be a Civil War Soldier!(1861-1865)
You Wouldn't Want To Work On The Railroads! (1860s)
You Wouldn't Want To Live In A Wild West Town!
(c. mid 19th Century)
You Wouldn’t Want To Be A Worker On The Statue
Of Liberty! (1876-1886)
You Wouldn't Want to Sail on the Titanic!(April 1912)
You Wouldn't Want To Be A Polar Explorer!
(Ernest Shackleton: 1914-1917)
You Wouldn't Want To Be On Apollo 13! (April 1970)

Source: FunSchooling.net

Can you think of other ways to use this series in the classroom? Leave a comment or drop me a line.