Our Tree Named Steve by Alan Zweibel, Illustrated by David Catrow
This is by no means a new book (published 2005) but is one of those unfamiliar gems that I discovered in my library. I wasn't familiar with the author- who I now found out was one of the original writers for Saturday Night Live. So cool! But I love love LOVE David Catrow's illustrations (think Molly Lou Melon and I Wanna Iguana) - that's what first drew me to this book. I fell in love with this sweet coming of age story. There are so many great lessons that could go with this book- life cycles, ecology, etc. but I used it with a lesson about text-to-text connections along with Shel Silverstein's The Giving Tree. Love both of these books so much that I loved this lesson just because the quality of the literature!!
