The Pocket Dogs

The Pocket Dogs is written by Margret Wild and illustrated by Stephen Michael King.The story tells of two tiny dogs, Biff and Buff, who ride in the big pockets of their owner’s coat: Biff in the right pocket and Buff in the left pocket. All is well until a hole appears in the right pocket. Both Biff and Buff try to tell Mr Pockets about the hole, but Mr Pockets doesn’t understand. One day, when Mr Pockets and his dogs are out shopping, Biff falls out, ‘On to the ground. On to his head.’

Biff is lost. Three people try to rescue him: a woman with a shopping basket, a little girl with a toy pram, and a man with a shopping trolley. Biff doesn’t want their help. He wants only Mr Pockets. At last Mr Pockets finds him. The hole in the pocket is sewn up, and Biff knows he is safe at last. He also knows how much he loves Mr Pockets, and how much he is loved in return.

Like all Margaret Wild’s picture books, The Pocket Dogs works on many different levels. On the one level it is a very simple, very straightforward story about a little dog who is lost and then found. But on and deeper reading, it is about many other things. Themes which arise in this picture book include family,vunerablility, identity, love and restoration.

In last weeks workshop we discussed narrative techniques The Pocket Dogs is an excellent picture book which uses alliteration, repetition and anthropomorphism (giving animals human traits).

 

 

The Pocket Dogs is the perfect story for young students, because it discusses feelings of love and belonging, feelings of loss and abandonment, feelings of who we are whilst also using a range of illustrations which are colourful and detailed and is something that students could look at.