The Animal Bridge LEVELED BOOK • O
A Reading A–Z Level O Leveled Book ThBe rAidngime al
Word Count: 735
I•L•O
Connections
Writing Written by Marcie Aboff
Pretend you are one of the animals Illustrated by Mark Meyers
in the story. Write a friendly letter
to the humans. Include your feelings www.readinga-z.com
about the bridge before and after it
was made.
Science
Think about the habitat of each animal
in the story. Discuss with a partner
what each animal needs to live.
Visit www.readinga-z.com
for thousands of books and materials.
ThBe rAidngime al Words to Know
construction progress
defeated sprayed
dizzy staggered
fumed trotting
humans
Written by Marcie Aboff The Animal Bridge Correlation
Illustrated by Mark Meyers Level O Leveled Book LEVEL O
© Learning A–Z
www.readinga-z.com Written by Marcie Aboff Fountas & Pinnell M
Illustrated by Mark Meyers Reading Recovery 20
Focus Question
All rights reserved. DRA 28
How do the animals’ feelings
change during the story? www.readinga-z.com
Bear was eating some juicy forest berries Bear growled. When will those humans
when Blue Jay swooped down next to him. stop building? he thought.
“The trucks are back,” Blue Jay screeched. They kept constructing roads through
the forest. In the process, they were
Rabbit hopped by and squealed, “They’re destroying the animals’ homes and food.
working on another construction project.” Some animals had even been hit by cars
when they tried to cross the busy roads!
“Oh no, not again!” Bear cried.
4
“It seems as though the humans just
finished building their busy highway,”
Rabbit complained.
Blue Jay reported, “They’re at it again,
chopping down trees and digging
up the dirt and grass.”
The Animal Bridge • Level O 3
Bear grabbed a bunch of berries and sat The animals gathered together at the
down by a tree to think. He wondered if woody hill.
his favorite berry bushes would be gone
soon, too. Then he noticed Deer trotting “We need to get tough!” Rabbit yelled
slowly toward him, her head down. to the animals.
“Yes,” they all agreed.
Bear asked, “What’s the matter, Deer?”
Deer moaned, “I’m all alone. I got cut off
from my herd near Moss Trail. Now I’m
too scared to cross the road to join them.”
“Enough is enough!” fumed Bear. “We
need to think of some way to stop the
humans.”
The Animal Bridge • Level O 5 6
“Too bad none of you can fly,” said Rabbit jumped down the hill. “I’m going
Blue Jay. “If you had wings, then you to stop them right now,” she said.
wouldn’t need to cross the roads.”
Rabbit dashed like lightning toward
“I can’t fly,” said Rabbit, “but I can chew.” Moss Trail. When she got there,
Rabbit showed off her two front teeth. she scurried underneath an empty
She said, “I have an idea. My big teeth parked truck.
can chew through anything. I can get
underneath the trucks and chew through Rabbit clenched her teeth on a wire.
the wires. Without their trucks working She chewed hard until . . . snap!
properly, the humans can’t dig up The wire split, but one of her big teeth
the land!” cracked. Rabbit came up from under
the truck and hopped back to the
The Animal Bridge • Level O 7 woody hill.
Rabbit showed her cracked tooth to the
other animals. “I did it,” she declared,
“but, ouch! Now my tooth hurts.”
8
Then Moose boasted, “I can use my Skunk bragged,
strong antlers to ram into anything. “My stench can
I’ll crush those trucks!” drive away the
workers.”
Moose marched to the forest. Headfirst,
he rammed into a truck. He made a dent. Skunk sprayed
a good whiff.
“Yes,” roared Moose. He hit the truck
again. It made another dent. He hit it “Gross!” Turtle
again. Now Moose was dizzy. He spun shouted. “You
around and around. The truck had three stink.”
big dents.
Turtle retreated into his shell. Skunk
Moose staggered back to the animals. laughed and scurried down to Moss Trail.
“We are making our mark,” he Skunk scampered behind the workers
announced. Then he fell down because and lifted her tail. The humans smelled
he was so dizzy. her odor immediately, grabbed masks
to cover their noses and mouths, and
The Animal Bridge • Level O 9 returned to their work.
Skunk returned to the woody hill.
“That was as easy as A-B-C,” she boasted.
10
The animals went to check on the
humans’ progress. They were upset to
see that the humans were still working
in the forest. Rabbit fumed, “Our efforts
were useless. The humans are still here.”
“No matter what we do, we can’t seem
to get rid of them,” sighed Bear.
For a long time, all the animals felt
defeated.
The Animal Bridge • Level O Then one day, they saw something
strange. They watched the workers put
dirt and grass over the bridge. Moose
said, “My goodness, humans are weird.”
11 12
Soon the workers left the bridge. “Hey, wait a minute,” Bear said. “That’s
a picture of me! I think this bridge was
Then, the animals saw the workers made for us.”
underneath the bridge. They were
putting signs by the side of the road The animals whooped and hollered.
that passed beneath the bridge.
“The humans are trying to help us,”
Rabbit exclaimed.
“They made their bridge into an animal
bridge,” Moose added, smiling.
Deer said, “Now I can find my herd.”
Then she bounded off into the forest.
The Animal Bridge • Level O 13 14
Glossary
construction the act of making or
(n.) building something (p. 3)
defeated (adj.) feeling unable to do
something (p. 11)
dizzy (adj.) feeling as though one is
spinning and losing one’s
balance (p. 9)
fumed (v.) felt or showed anger (p. 5)
humans (n.) people (p. 3)
progress (n.) forward movement toward
a goal (p. 11)
sprayed (v.) sprinkled or forced out
many drops of a liquid
(p. 10)
staggered (v.) moved or walked in an
unsteady manner (p. 9)
The animals stood peering down at the trotting (v.) moving at a pace that is just
busy traffic below the bridge. faster than walking (p. 5)
“Hooray for our bridge!” Bear cheered.
The Animal Bridge • Level O 15 16
