The Jungle Sun

The Jungle Sun is an animal fantasy story with a series of fictional newspaper reports. Some of the headlines of reports in The Jungle Sun newspaper include: Flying Squirrel Gets Tail Tangled, Anacondas Shelter in Trees, and Fierce Storm Hits Jungle. The story includes text features like headlines, columns of type, and symbols.

The Jungle Sun is designed as a series of eight newspaper reports. Critical thinking questions are provided to guide the reader. Illustrations match the text by visually showing what the different columns are talking about. A visual information guide is provided for teachers to draw students’ attention to the headlines, graphics, style, font, and text highlighters as well as the information, layout, and design of the reports. There is an infographic at the end of the story outlining the purpose and procedures for designing a newspaper report. An activity on designing a newspaper report demonstrating different visual features is provided for teachers to extend students’ learning.

Readers develop vocabulary such as nouns (crocodile), verbs (throw), and singular/plural (branch/branches). Opportunities arise to discuss apostrophes to show possession (bird’s eggs) and apostrophes within contractions (couldn’t). Focus on short and long vowel i, the suffix ly (quickly), the prefix un (untangled), and base words (snapped).

This title is from the Sails Literacy series. Hook readers and ignite their curiosity - over 850 levelled texts with bright, colourful, sophisticated designs.