Do Ants Get Lost?: Learning about Animal Communication with the Garbage Gang

by Thomas Kingsley Troupe, Derek Toye (Illustrator)

The Garbage Gangs picnic is invaded by ants! How do those little ants find their way around anyway? The gang meets a dog that tells them all about scent marking and animal communication, and suddenly it all makes scents!

Genres: Nonfiction, Graphic Novels

24 pages, Library Binding

First published July 1, 2014

Reviews

[Rosalie Beyer-Krohn · Rating 5 out of 5]

Children will be eager to learn about science with the Garbage Gang in this fun and playful graphic novel on various forms of animal communication. The Garbage Gang learns that many animal behaviors, such as dogs peeing on things, are actually a way for animals to communicate with each other.

Genre: Graphic Novel - The story/information is presented through a hybrid of text and pictures, primarily relying on dialogue bubbles for text.

Reading Level: M

Writing Mentor Trait: Presentation - Presentation is naturally a major component of graphic novels, but The Garbage Gang uses this format to create an informational text that is especially engaging and easy to follow. It is as if you are watching an educational cartoon in the format of a book - great for encouraging literacy! It isn't exactly easy to pull off this type of book though; dialogue and pictures must be carefully constructed to support understanding. This writing approach could be a great exercise for students to apply critical thinking to their writing. "Do Ants Get Lost" would make an excellent mentor text by providing examples of how dialogue and pictures can work together to create understanding.

Other Classroom Uses: It could also be used to teach students about non-verbal communication and how people communicate through their actions and gestures.

[Debra · Rating 2 out of 5]

I tripped across a Garbage Gang book and thought to be fair I should try to read a few others hoping I would find out this very diverse group of friends got together in the first place and ended up living in a garbage dump or junk yard - not sure which. None of the ones I read had any more info on my initial inquiry.
The Gang does have some individual quirks and scientific facts are shared in an interesting manner. Personally I think there has to be a book with actual photographs of ants and how they live and navigate which would be more informative. But, maybe, if you are like the Brick an illustrated version would be less scary.

[Leigh Isley · Rating 5 out of 5]

With lots of humor Kingsley developed a fun way to learn. In a simple graphic novel way, he teaches about Matter, The Digestive System, and How Animals Communicate in their own animalist ways. The character illustrations are introduced at the beginning giving a little sort script of their own unique personalities. As you read you follow such zany characters as Soggy a stuffed bear whose pride was insulted when she fell into a puddle of dumpster juice and Rick the brick who is terrified of bugs and especially bees. These odd characters will keep you entertained as you learn a thing or two about life’s curiosities. In the back of the books there are small indexes, critical thinking questions, and internet sites where you can explore more on these topics. For ages 6-8 years of age