Drowned City: Hurricane Katrina and New Orleans

Written and Illustrated by Don Brown

Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 2015

A graphic novel that follows the heart-wrenching true story of New Orleans when Hurricane Katrina hit. 

Lexile Level: GN920L

Age Range: 11-13 years

Page Count: 96

Suggested Delivery: Individual Read

Robert F. Sibert Informational Book Medal Honor 2016; Orbis Pictus Award Winner 2016

Key Words: Struggle, Loss, Help, Devastation, Storm

Information Resources:

Remembering Hurricane Katrina Article

http://magazines.scholastic.com/kids-press/news/2015/08/Remembering-Hurricane-Katrina

This is an article from Scholastic which gives information about what happened and a little about what happened afterwards. This would be great for the students to read after they read the book. There is a map on the side of the article that would be good for the students because it shows exactly where Hurricane Katrina hit.  

Don Brown Website

http://www.booksbybrown.com/

This is a link to Don Brown's website. This would be great for the students who enjoyed reading Drowned City, because there is a complete list of Don Brown's other books each with a picture and description. There is also a description of Don Brown himself that could be read before reading. 

Vocabulary:

• Hurricane: a big storm with very fast winds.
• Devastation: a great destruction or damage.
• Levees: a landing place that is built to prevent river water from overflowing into a town. 
• Survivor: a person who has remained alive in a circumstance where others have died.
• Evacuation: the removal of someone or something from a dangerous situation.
• Storm Surge: the rising of sea as a result of a storm. 

Teaching Suggestions:

1. As a nonfiction text have the students do research after reading the text into the lives of some of the survivors of Hurricane Katrina and have them create a profile for one of the people that they found.
2. After reading the book have the students pick 4 words from the text that they did not know before reading the book, or words that they find interesting and fill out a vocabulary word map like: http://www.readingrockets.org/content/pdfs/wordmap.pdf so that they can better understand the words.
3. Have the students write a letter as if they were one of the survivors of Hurricane Katrina to one of their family members who was not affected by Hurricane Katrina paying attention to adding details about the events that they found in the book and during their research. 

Reading Strategies: 

1. Before: Create an Anticipation Guide with 5 facts that come out of Drowned City making some of them true and some of them false. Before even showing the students the book have them answer the 5 questions and answer them with true or false. Ask questions such as: Hurricane Katrina happened in Katrina, False. Many people lost their homes and lives in Hurricane Katrina, True. Some people did not want to leave their homes, True. 
2. During: Create a graphic organizer for the students to fill out to keep track of everything that goes on during the book. Have the graphic organizer focus on the major points in the novel and not on the dates so the students can create a timeline after reading.
3. After: Have the students create a timeline after they have finished reading of the events that took place in the book. Have the students draw a picture for each of the events that they put on the timeline. 

Writing Activity:

Since this book is nonfiction have the students do more research into Hurricane Katrina and have them pretend they are a news reporter and give a report as if they were reporting from when Hurricane Katrina hit. Before they can give the report to the class, they have to write it out first to hand in.