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Ivan is now happily living in a good zoo.

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Welcome To The Elephant Sanctuary in Tennessee

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Join us LIVE on #WorldElephantDay from our Elephant Orphanage Project in Zambia with our partner Game Rangers International!  We’ll meet the elephant orphans during their favorite time of the day — bottle feeding.

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World Elephant Day is an international annual event on August 12, dedicated to the preservation and protection of the world's elephants. Conceived in 2011 by Canadian filmmakers Patricia Sims and Michael Clark of Canazwest Pictures, and Sivaporn Dardarananda, Secretary-General of the Elephant Reintroduction Foundation in Thailand, it was officially founded, supported and launched by Patricia Sims and the Elephant Reintroduction Foundation on August 12, 2012.[1] Since that time, Patricia Sims continues to lead and direct World Elephant Day, which is now supported by over 65 wildlife organizations[2] and many individuals in countries across the globe

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Discuss the importance of memory in this story.
How does Ivan’s perception change when he begins to remember more of his own history? What are his most vivid memories? What was Ivan’s name in the forest?

Why is it important for him to remember his name and his life as a baby gorilla?

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What is Ivan’s initial reaction to the arrival of Ruby? How does her arrival affect all the other animals at the mall? When and why do Ivan’s feelings about Ruby change?

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Compare the personalities of Mack and George. How are they alike, and how are they different? What is the meaning of “family” to each of them? What are the contradictions in Mack’s character?

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entwined

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incline

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Pablo Ruiz Picasso was a Spanish painter, sculptor, printmaker, ceramicist and theatre designer who spent most of his adult life in France.

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spiraling

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similes: The author uses similes a lot. There is a good example of one in the chapter entitled "stella." Can you find it?
Can you write one of your own about Ivan?

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crevice

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macaw

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shackles

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pedestal

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He's not angry. He's calm and never really angry.

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They wanted wanted it to look more cool, not as boring. The picture looks way more fierce which would be more interesting to people.

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When he said that I think he wanted to do an act, but Mack wanted Ivan to just be himself.

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I notice when Ivan alone, by himself, he doesn't really play; he's kind of lazy. The gorillas in the wild like play around and wrestle. The gorillas who are free have a more interesting life.

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It's in Africa and I have a friend that use to live in Kenya.

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Why are Ivan's drawings important to MacK?

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Why doesn't Ivan get bored drawing, even though he draws the same things over and over again.

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Why do you think people pay for Ivan's drawings, even though they don't recognize what he has drawn?

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What is the special bond between Julia and Ivan? How is she different from the other children who come to see him?

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When I get sad about having to stay at home all the time, I can think about Ivan and how much better it is for me, than it was for him. At least I can talk with people and see them on Face Time.  I have books I can read and television, movies and long walks. Not so awful compared to Ivan.

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Joekai, I totally agree with both you comments. Instead of posting them  under what I posted you can creat your own post. Just tap on the plus sign or twice on the brown area and a window will pop up for you. Put your name in where it says title and type away.

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Like Stella, we'll gather a list of Bob's characteristics to explain why Ivan calls him a best friend.

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As we continue to read we're going to be paying close attention to Stella and what she's like. What are her characteristics that make Ivan call her a best friend? Where in the text did you find evidence to support it?

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Why doesn’t Ivan express any anger in the beginning of the story?

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Why do you think the sign for the Big Top Mall shows Ivan as angry and fierce?

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We'll read through “gone” together and then you can post your answer to this question and the two below this.

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We'll read through “gone” together and then you can post your answer to this question and the two below this.

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What does Ivan mean when he says, “In my size humans see a test of themselves” (p. 4), and “I am too much gorilla and not enough human” (p. 7)?

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I know the picture at the bottom is strange, but tap on it and it will take you to a video of gorillas living in the wild. Post your thoughts about how it compares to the way Ivan lives. Do gorillas seem to prefer living alone or in families? What else did you notice about them from the video?

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Meet This Family of Mountain Gorillas | Cousins | BBC Earth

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Gorillas can be found in Rwanda. What continent is it in?

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Joekai, this book is based on a gorilla that really was kept at a mall, in a cage all by himself. Here's a short video about him. It will give you an introduction to the book and an idea of what it was like for Ivan. In a post, tell me how it makes you feel and what you think about it.

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Ivan the gorilla lived alone in a shopping mall for over 20 years (The Urban Gorilla)

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Gorillas can be found in Rwanda. What continent is it in?

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I know this picture is strange, but tap on it and it will take you to a video of gorillas living in the wild.

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Meet This Family of Mountain Gorillas | Cousins | BBC Earth

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I know you like to draw, so thought you might have fun trying this.

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Chapter 1-We'll read this together and then you can post your answer to this question and the two below this.

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Chapter 1-We'll read this together and then you can post your answer to this question and the two below this.

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What does Ivan mean when he says, “In my size humans see a test of themselves” (p. 4), and “I am too much gorilla and not enough human” (p. 7)?

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Why do you think the sign for the Big Top Mall shows Ivan as angry and fierce?

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Why doesn’t Ivan express any anger in the beginning of the story?

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This woman worked with Ivan for 10 years and talks about what part was true about the book and what the real Ivan was like.

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This is a short 7 minute interview you can listen to and some information to read.

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The school year is drawing to a close, but NPR's Backseat Book Club has plenty of reading lined up for the summer. Our June pick is The One and Only Ivan, a Newbery Medal-winning book by Katherine Applegate. It tells the story of a gorilla who spent 27 years in a shopping mall in Tacoma, Wash. - and it's based on a true story. The real-life Ivan finally made his way to the Atlanta Zoo. Applegate joined NPR's Michele Norris at the National Zoo in Washington, D.C., to talk about Ivan, and what she finds so captivating about primates.

"Their manual dexterity, it's so human," she says. "I think, though, it's the eyes that get me. That penetrating gaze, that intelligence; it's hard not to be anthropomorphic when you're looking at a great ape - at any primate - but especially with gorillas. They're just so magnificent."

The book begins with a simple introduction: "Hello. I am Ivan. I am a gorilla. It's not as easy as it looks." It's not easy because Ivan lives far from the wild at the Exit 8 Big Top Mall and Video Arcade. Ivan is always on display, but it's not a one-way street; Ivan watches all the people watching him, and his observations about humans are among the greatest delights in the book. It's a lonely life, but he does have a few loyal friends, including a highly opinionated dog, an aging elephant and, eventually, a baby elephant who sets Ivan's life on an entirely new course.

Interview Highlights
On writing a story about animals in captivity
"Ivan's story was so compelling and so bizarre. The fact that he had been captured as an infant from the Democratic Republic of the Congo and brought to Tacoma, Wash., to live in a mall? ... It was beyond comprehension when I first came across this story in The New York Times. The headline read, ' Gorilla Sulks in [a] Mall as His Future Is Debated.' This was about 20 years ago. They were trying to figure out what to do with this guy, and I thought, 'There's a story there, I just have to figure out how to tell it.' "

On trying to meet Ivan
"I tried to meet Ivan. I went to the zoo. I took my 13-year-old daughter - she was about 10 at the time - and it was a very wet day. Ivan hated wet weather, and he never came out, and I sat there for hours in the rain, and my daughter was looking at me, going, 'Are you crazy, Mom?' ... I'd flown all the way to Atlanta! I was determined to see him! But at the end of the day I realized this guy actually had some control over his environment. In the old days would he have been able to go anywhere? To make a choice like that? And it was really validating. I was OK that he couldn't come out. I did go to his memorial service later, though."
On Ivan's memorial service
"His keeper Jodi Carrigan told stories about Ivan. He was quite a character. He liked to wear a sombrero. He hated wet weather so he would carry around a burlap coffee bag and stick it under his butt and slide around on the grass that way. He was, um, not shy about making his needs known."
On becoming a writer
"I think all writers write from the time they're really young, and you just start asking the question, 'What if?' What if you were sitting here next to me and you turned into a cat? I have a story. So I was writing at a really young age, but it took me a long time to be brave enough to become a published writer, or to try to become a published writer. It's a very public way to fail. And I was kind of scared, so I started out as a ghost writer, and I wrote for other series, like Disney Aladdin and Sweet Valley and books like that. And my husband, Michael Grant, and I started a series called Animorphs, about kids who can turn into animals, and that was our big first success."
On what she'd like young readers to take away from the book
"I think we have a real obligation when we do have animals in captivity to understand their needs and to care for them as well as we can. Stella the elephant in Ivan says, 'You know humans surprise you sometimes,' and I hope that the next generation can surprise us all."

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Meet 'Ivan': The Gorilla Who Lived In A Shopping Mall

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The school year is drawing to a close, but NPR's Backseat Book Club has plenty of reading lined up for the summer. Our June pick is The One and Only Ivan, a Newbery Medal-winning book by Katherine Applegate. It tells the story of a gorilla who spent 27 years in a shopping mall in Tacoma, Wash.