✦Mary Pope Osborne · Reading companion
The Magic Tree House series
Start with Dinosaurs Before Dark and explore curiosity, evidence, and the boundary between facts and imagination.
A book to read together
The Magic Tree House series
Original prompts to use with your copy.
This original Curiosi reading companion focuses on Dinosaurs Before Dark, the first Magic Tree House chapter book by Mary Pope Osborne, illustrated by Sal Murdocca. Bring a family or library copy of the original chapter book. Graphic adaptations and other series editions have different credits, so check your copy. Use the prompts across several comfortable reading sessions.
Pack a question for your reading
Before beginning, study the title, cover, and contents in your copy. Invite a question the child would like to explore. Sort your initial ideas into observations about the book and guesses about its adventure. Choose a manageable stopping point together and keep a bookmark for a question you want to revisit.
Follow a decision with a clue
During a reading session, choose one decision from the chapter you have read. What does the character notice, and what do they decide to do? Point to a detail in your copy that supports the answer. Ask what other information could be useful. Revisit the question at the next session if the story gives you a new clue.
Separate a story idea from a research question
After reading, choose one detail you would like to investigate outside the story. Identify which part belongs to its imagined adventure and which question could be checked in an age-appropriate nonfiction book or museum resource. With an adult, find a source and say what it tells you. It is fine to leave a question open when evidence is missing.
Make observation and imagination cards
Look closely at a familiar plant and draw one detail you can observe. On another card, invent an impossible change, such as the plant floating above its pot. Explain which picture records an observation and which uses imagination. Then invent a new question about the real plant and discuss how you could investigate it.
Your turn to read
Keep the conversation going
There is no single right answer. Invite young readers to notice, wonder and imagine.
What clue helped explain a decision?
Which question would you check outside the story?
How could you tell an observation from an invented detail?
Make something: Choose a question from your bookmark. Draw two places you might look for an answer, such as a library book and a museum display. Ask an adult to help you compare what you find.
