The Case of the Missing Water

 


Grade - 4th 
Genre - Fiction

Theme - Finding Water
Written - Shalini Srinivasan
Illustrated - Upamanyu Bhattacharyya
Published - Pratham Books

About the Author

Shalini Srinivasan is a comic book writer, and an occasional research writer.She has worked with and written several comics for Amar Chitra Katha. Comics are also among her research interests – she did a PhD thesis on graphic journalism at the University of Hyderabad. Shalini writes fiction, often for children. Her most recent work is the Manasa series of picture books with Pratham Books.

Synopsis

Ranj’s village is dry and everyone in the village is moving to the city due to insufficiency of water. Ranj has solved a lot of mysteries at home and she takes this as an opportunity to add to her mystery cases. She travels the village and goes on asking the people around whether they know where the water has gone. She continues solving the mystery with her classmate Sapna and locates all the tanks of the village. They soon find water and the reason behind the inadequacy of it in the village. 

Reading-Writing Strategies

Pre-Reading

1. Concepts of water can be discussed following with why it is essential to save water. 

2. A class debate can be done on where the class thinks the water went. 

During-reading 

1. An only voice role play can be done in the class. Roles can be divided.

Post-reading

1. A treasure hunt can be organised where children can find water with certain clues given to them such as: Clue 1- I am white and black, my best friends are duster and chalk. Guess who am I(blackboard). Clue 2- You throw your trash in me, i help you to keep your school clean(Dustbin). Clue 3- I have four legs and I am brown in colour. Guess who am I? (table)

Reflection

The story is beautifully written, with elaborated illustrations to support and elevate the text. The story is a good way to tell the children the importance of water as well as village. It is age appropriate, but there are words which the facilitator would have to discuss with the children which will also help the children to build their vocabulary. Overall, the book is very well written and throughout the story it maintains the engagement.