This class has been such a gift to me this semester.
Okay I am very sorry, but I did not like this book at all and I do not know why! Or maybe that's not even it. I liked the book, I just don't know what to say about it. It was a likable, silly story, but that was it. There was not a lot of substance to it really- which is funny because it is about a skeleton haha! I really think that students would like this book as a read aloud because on every page it says "hic hic hic" and I could see students wanting to read along with that. This book would be very good to use in a series around the Halloween season. The ending would also be very amusing to students. "Then ghost got smart. Hic, hic, hic. Found a mirror. Hic, hic, hic. Held it up. Hic, hic, hic. Skeleton screamed! The hiccups left. They jumped away. Hurray!"
I really do not know where to start with this book. It is probably important to point out that I read So Far From the Bamboo Grove first so I am partial to it. That does not mean that I did not like this book. For sure it was just as heart wrenching at times as the other book in this paired text set, but it had just as much hope mixed in. One thing about this book that was not as strong for me was that it was not a true story, though it could have easily been the story of any child in Korea at the time. One thing that I really did like about this book though, was that it did not end when Japan surrendered. It goes on to talk about how the Russians came into Korea next. It is almost as if the nightmare just kept going for this family. What I liked about that though is, I had no idea that that happened. I am a little ashamed to admit that I learned about a major world history event in a fictional children's novel, but it is true none the less. This is why these kind of text sets are such a good idea in the classroom! You learn about history in a way that you never really thought you could. Plus, this would be far more interesting for students than simply reading about all this in a textbook. Even the best textbooks cant rival the novel for the human spirit and the connection the reader needs to feel something for the topic in question. This is why these kinds of text sets are such a good idea. I would absolutely use this kind of thing in my classroom.
This book made me realize that I would really like to know more about Marie Antoinette. She is such a famous historical character, but I feel like everything that I know about her is hearsay. Like that whole, "let them eat cake" thing, totally false, but that is what people know about her. Perhaps I will have to look into some more literature on her. At any rate, I liked this book for several reasons. The first being that it is told from the point of view of her puppy- and I love puppies ( a shocking revelation I know.) The other reason is because of the historical content. It is about history and a famous historical character, but it is told in a way that is easy to relate to. As I have said before, animals are such a good way to relate things to children. In this case, we see the life of Marie Antoinette through the eyes of her beloved pet Pug, who the author named Sebastian. Interestingly, Marie was only aloud to bring a few personal possessions with her into her new life in France, and her Pug was one of them. I feel like this fact would make this figure relatable to students because many students will have dogs and many more will have some kind of pet. The other thing that is kind of nice here is that because it is from the puppy's point of view, it is pretty simple even though very complicated things were going on in actuality. One thing that I did not like about this book was that it was actually pretty sad. Fitting I guess because her life wasn't exactly happy, but I was sad for Sebastian. In the story as Marie became more of a queen she quit having time for her puppy so he became lonely. Silly? Maybe. My boyfriend laughed at me when he looked over at me reading this book and found me very distraught. Still though, to me, every dog anywhere could by my Louie so I relate to them maybe a little more than I should. Anyway, the ending is happy, because Marie's daughter finds Sebastian and adopts him as her own and he is happy and loved again. At the very end of the book, the author has an actual short biography of Marie Antoinette, who was actually called Antonia or Antoinette by her family. I liked this because some of the facts from the book were not quite true. For example, her marriage was not happy at all, and in the story it seems like it was pretty okay.
First of all, I just want to say that these tiny little images make me sad :-( This one however makes me particularly sad because now you cant see the detail that I can on the cover art. The first thing that I noticed while reading this book were the illustrations and I don't necessarily mean that in a good way. They were awesome as far as details go, but at the same time, the kids look downright creepy! What it is I think is that they look like little adults with these big, round, shiny faces. I dunno. They were a little bit distracting for me while I was reading actually. That having been said though, I do appreciate Matt Novak's obvious attention for details in the illustrations. Some of the scenes he probably could have gotten away with not quite as much, but he went for it anyway. I really like that in the illustrations of all the children everywhere having one giant pillow fight, no two children look the same and they all have different pajamas on.
I honestly can't believe that it has taken me this long to talk about his book! It was one of my absolute favorites when I was younger. Did I see the movie though, you say? Absolutely not. Why? Because they totally ruined it! i could tell just from the trailer that only a few things were kept the same from the original telling, which is highly disappointing because it was fine just on its own. When I was little I always thought about how cool it would be to live in a place where food rained from the sky. Then when I got a little bit older, but not quite old enough to outgrow the book, I realized that if it truly rained food it would not be suitable to eat because of all the nasty things in the atmosphere. Another fanciful idea struck down by knowledge and science for that matter. I still enjoyed the book though. I think that the illustrations were one of the best parts. It is funny because what I enjoyed so much about those illustrations is still what I hold as the gold standard for a good illustration today, and that is attention to detail. Each illustration in this book was done with a careful eye, and nothing was left out. Not to be too general here, but my other favorite part of this book was the story. Not only is it amusing, but there are lessons to be learned. This is the story of a town where the weather does not consist of rain and snow, but of hot dogs and hamburgers and other foods. Life was good in the obviously fictional town of Chewandswallow until there is the hurricane equivalent of food dumped on the city. The residents are forced to flee for their lives, lest they be squished by a giant pancake or run over by an enormous rolling doughnut. What lesson can be learned from this silly story? There are two actually. The first is this: too much of a good thing is a bad thing. The townspeople had been glad to get their food for free from the sky, but when the weather spins out of control they are forced to leave, ergo too much=bad. The other lesson comes from a part of the book that I did not mention. The story begins by a grandfather telling his grandchildren this story of the town Chewandswallow. This celebrates not only the entertainment value of books and the importance of reading and sharing them together, but it also highlights the tradition of the oral story.
I chose this book because I thought that it was going to be cute and I was right. This was a very cute book! It was another that after I read it once I thought it was just for entertainment's sake, but after thinking about it I discovered that there was more value to it than that. The story starts with a large mouse family who likes to watch TV. The problem is that they can never agree on what it is that they should watch. The dad mouse wants to watch action, mama wants to watch a comedy and so on. It goes through all the different genres of TV show that you could possibly want to watch. Than one day, the TV is broken and the mouse family is a little lost at first. Then they start to entertain themselves in other ways. I liked this because, even though I do enjoy turning on the tube at the end of a long day, I feel like there is too much emphasis on it these day, especially with our youth. This book could be used for a bunch of different things. It could be a topic starter to get to know students. You could have them talk about what kind of TV they like to watch and then maybe they could get into groups and put together a skit that would show what their genre was. This would be good for planning and writing skills, as well as using imaginations to come up with props and everything. this book could also be used as the jumping off point to talk about what we could do with our time besides watch TV. Two of my favorite things about this book though? One, the mouse family was all together when they were deciding how to spend their time and two, they decide to read a book. One thing though about the book that was interesting to me. We know from the beginning of the book that the dad mouse likes action/adventure, and what kind of story finally gets read at the end of the book? An action/adventure story is read by the dad. I don't know what this means really but it felt significant to me that the dad is the only one whose genre was addressed.
This was an odd book and I cant really decide if I liked it or not. On one hand I am certain that students would like it given the nonsensical rhymes. On the other though is that the rhymes are just that, nonsense. I think I would have liked it better if the words were all real. For example, "N was once a little needle, Needly, Tweedly, Threedly, Needly Wisky wheedly little needle." Now to be fair, tweed is a word, but tweedly is not. I guess what I am trying to say is that this book would have been more successful for me personally if he had used it to teach students about the alphabet and rhyming words. It would have been more meaningful. The other thing that bothered me a little about this book were some of the letter examples. Some of them students would not know, though they could figure it out from the illustration- one possible upside to this book could be that it would help teach students to look at illustrations for text clues. One letter though that they probably wouldn't know or couldn't get unless they already knew it, would be U. "U was once a little urn, urny, burny, turny, urny, bubbly burny little urn." Okay so not only would you have to explain to students that an urn holds the remains of a person who was cremated after they died, you would have to explain cremation. No thank you. The idea of cremation is a little disturbing to me know as an adult, I really don't know how I would have felt about it elementary school, but it would have been similar. Also, could we look at the rhyming words here? "Bubbly burny?" Gross! So as far as alphabet books go, you could do better for sure.
The first thing I want to talk about with this book are the illustrations. Each one appears to have been hand painted on canvas before it was made into an illustration for the book. One word. Wow. I can't even imagine how long it would have taken to do all of these paintings. They really add something to the book as well, they set a mood. The fact that they are done in such a realistic fashion helps to make the reader feel that this story could have actually happened. In addition the quality of the illustrations make it easy to envision yourself in the book. The illustrations also set a more serious tone to the book, which is fitting considering the topic is the Titanic. Really though, I just cant say enough good things about them, they are beautiful and very realistic. It just occurred to me too that they were a very good choice on the author's part. Just think of how ridiculous this book would have been and how different the tone if the illustrations had been cartoons instead.
I loved this book! It was so cute, and it even had a moral in it. Okay, so it took me a little thinking to get to it, but I did and here it is: do unto others as you would have them do unto you! This is the lesson that Goldie's brother must learn as he torments his older sister while she is sick and in doing so ends up with the chicken pox himself. One of my favorite things about this book was how it incorporated different fairytales and different fairytale characters into this story. For example, the three bears from Goldie Locks and the Three Bears are mentioned and little red riding hood. More than that though, there are characters from rhymes. "Jack be nimble! Jack be quick! Come and see! My sister's sick!" It reminded me of the Shrek movies and how they managed to squeeze nearly every fairytale and folktale in to it, and they did it in such a clever way! One of the other things that I liked about this book was that the illustrations look vintage. They look like they belong in a book with cardboard covers and a shiny gold binding. Even the furniture and the dress looks like this book was written in the forties. Last thing that I really liked about this book is that it flowed so nicely. This is due in part to the fact that the words all rhyme, but still it was nice to read, like the verbal equivalent of looking at an aesthetically pleasing painting.
I picked this book off the shelf first because for whatever reason I thought it was going to be about politics- donkeys on the cover and its about a big elephant, I dunno. Anyway, I thought that it would be interesting to see politics from a children's book point of view. This was however, not about politics. In the end though I was okay with this because it ended up being something just as interesting. We have all heard this phrase "the big elephant in the room". It refers to something that is very obvious that nobody mentions, but everybody knows. For example, an elephant in the room would be a bad smell. It is obvious, everyone smells it, but nobody wants to mention it. Or it could be a topic of discussion that everyone knows about, but nobody brings up to talk about like a divorce or something like that. At any rate, it is a common phrase. What this book has done though is make the phrase into something that children can understand, and it does it in a funny way. It starts off with one of the friends asking, "Can we talk about the big elephant in the room?" And the other friend says "The big elephant? As in the BIG problem? I was expecting this! Because I ate all the crunchy-nut ice cream?!" He goes on asking if other things are the proverbial "elephant in the room" and finally the other friend says "No! No! No! I don't care about any of those things...I was just asking about the big elephant in the room!" Then they both look into the living room and an actual elephant is sitting on the sofa, "Oh, that big elephant! That's Stanley." 
Love That Dog? How about Love That Book? That was corny but it had to be done. Yes, I did love this book. It was charming and simple, yet deep in its own right. It introduces the idea that children of all ages, or anyone, for that matter can write poetry. Which is important for children to realize. This book would be so perfect to help introduce that to students because it shows an average little boy writing poetry that his teacher loves. I think that praise from the teacher is a good example for students to see, because even though Jack thinks his poetry is silly, his teacher wants to put it up on the board. It is also a good way to approach teaching poetry to students. Putting everybody's poetry up on the board for everyone to see, leaving off names if the student so desires. I thought that it was interesting that Jack didn't want his name on his poetry just because it is not uncommon for people to write poetry anonymously. It can be such a personal thing for people, as it clearly ended up being for Jack once he became more comfortable with the emotions that were coming up about his dog and the blue car. All in all I guess my favorite part about this book was that it brought poetry down from its seemingly lofty position and bestowed it upon us mere mortals and made it seem reachable. 
Okay so here is a smidge more bias showing, I picked this book out because theme was dogs, and I love dogs! The first thing that came to mind when I saw this book, aside from being excited about the subject, was what a great book for a student that didn't think they would like poetry but loves dogs. This would be one of those books that you could use as a platform for students who weren't sure about reading where you use the subject to entice your students. I know that when I was little I would have been all over this. Anyway, as the title would suggest, all of the poems are about dogs. They are not uniform though and I liked that about it. For example, some of the poems are only two lines and others go on for several stanzas. They are also about all different kinds of dogs in different situations. One of my favorites was this:
This would be such a fun book to do with younger students, it would be particularly nice in a big book setting so that all of the students could see it to participate. The really neat thing about this book of poetry is that it incorporates sounds. There are lots of action words that you would find in comic books, for example lots of EEEK! and WHACK! SMACK! THUD! I just think that little ones would have a blast making the sounds along with you while you read out loud. The other really neat thing about this book is that there seems to be a poem for every season and occasion. There is a Halloween poem, a winter poem, one about the Fourth of July and one about going to the barber. This book could also potentially be a way to incorporate instruments into your book time. For example, you could use drums or tambourines and other different types of noise makers to stand in for the different noises. I really think that so far this is my favorite of all the poetry books I have looked at. Couldn't be cuter and there are so many things to do with it!
The other part of this book's title is "And Other Surprising Sequels to Mother Goose Rhymes". That was important to share because it really explains the book, as does the front cover, I feel. These are almost re-imaginings of these classic rhymes because they include the original and then go on to say more about them. Or they include a short passage from the original rhyme and build on it. One interesting thing for me was that I did not know some of the Mother Goose rhymes in here, or at least not all of them. I was surprised to find some of them a little gruesome actually. My favorite rhyme in this book was both funny and a little grotesque. It is a re-imagining of Three Blind Mice. 
This book was unique in a way because it used some language native to the area of Zanzibar. This was neat because, not only could you use it to help teach students about different cultures, but you could use it to teach about languages. Anyway, this whole book is poems about Zanzibar and, I assume, a family that lives there. Some of the poems rhyme and some of them do not, it is nice how they switched that up. One of my favorites was called Rainy Season, it goes like this:
This is the first book of poetry that I have looked at that is aimed at the little ones out there, and I must say that I enjoyed it. One thing that I am going to have to get used to as far as children's poetry is concerned is that it seems to have a different purpose from adult poetry. Children's poetry, from what I have so far gleaned is much more lighthearted and more story based. Whereas most adult poetry I have come into contact with is about emotions and matters of the heart and generally heavier topics. I have also noticed that adult poetry tends to be a little bit abstract in that you have to think about the meaning that the author is wanting to convey. And in my opinion, I can only take rhyming poems seriously if they are for the little ones. Of course this just could be because I have a general dislike for a certain someone that I knew who's poetry always rhymed- hey bias is bound to come out somewhere! At any rate, this particular book of poetry was centered around that idea of etiquette for children, only it isn't real etiquette. Instead, it is silly backward etiquette written by a woman named Miss Information (very clever).
All kinds of emotions are present both in this book and in me when I think about this book. Personally, I have never read any books specifically about war. They just aren't really my genre because when I read I want to have drama but more in a things-are-bad-but-not-in-a-life-and-death-kinda-way. That does not mean though that I didn't enjoy this book. Well, maybe enjoy isn't the right word. To me "enjoy" would seem to imply that this was a happy book, if that makes any sense. And even though it had its moments, by and large, this book wasn't about happy. It was about hope and the human spirit and condition. It was about family and surviving all obstacles together. Some parts of this were just painful to read. I know that it is something that came up in discussion a lot and it was mentioned in nearly every ones blog, but the part where the baby was thrown out the window of the train. Okay. It isn't that I don't understand why this was done, they couldn't leave the body behind for all kinds of reasons. It feels though like this is one scene in particular that outlines the true horrors of war. In a very literal sense, everything that is true and pure about the world, like a child, is thrown out the window during war. The other children in this story are another example of this though as well, they don't have to die to be horribly scarred by the events of war. This is something that is evident in every war ever fought, right up to today. It is always the people and the children, the civilians, who are hurt most by war. Despite all of the hardship that Yoko and her family endure, I am glad that there was a semi-happy ending when her brother comes and meets up with them. Honestly, it reminded me of seeing my brother for the first time after he came back fighting in Iraq.
A couple of things can be told about this book from simply looking at it. First of all, the title is very revealing. It implies that, not unlike in So Far From the Bamboo Grove, a major theme here is going to be loss. Not just loss of family and friends, but loss of places too. For example, homes and villages. It could also be a goodbye to everything that is comfortable and familiar to the main characters. Also, loss of life, both in a metaphorical and literal sense. Metaphorical in that so much will be given up and sacrificed that ones identity could eventually be lost. Literally speaks for itself really, because this is a story about war, death seems inevitable. Something that can be told from the cover of the book is that the main character is Japanese, because of the flag behind her. Also, there is barbed wire strung across the girl in the illustration, signifying to me that a theme could be loss of freedom. This could refer to the main character herself or the entire nation.
Okay so I picked this book because I saw by flipping through it that it had little bits of Spanish in it, which I thought was pretty cool. Here is the thing though, this book was a little hard to follow. See, Skippyjon Jones is a kitten who thinks he is a dog, more specifically a red Chihuahua. He also loves outer space. And here is where things get off. Skippy walks into his closet and is immediately sent into orbit, where he almost collides with a comet filled with Chihuahuas. These Chimichangos as they are now referred to as inform him that they are going to build a pipeline to carry chili polvo from Mars to Earth. From here he meets aliens, discovers he is lost and has a tug-of-war with a green martian that looks just like him but with one eye. This hurtles him back through space and through his closet door where he lands with a KA-BOOM in his bed. And the Spanish that I thought was so neat? Turns out that it was neat and used correctly, but it really just made the story harder to follow, and I have a feeling that if you didn't know the words you would be lost too. Where there weren't Spanish words, the author added "-ito" to the end of words, like astronaut-ito. This was cute and all, but a little insulting to the language. Like how people say that they can speak Spanish and then they just add an "o" to the end of everything. I'm not even a native speaker and that irritates me. Plus, can you imagine how confusing that would be to a student learning to read. I know of a student who would start out on this book and give up when he realized that the words weren't English. To make the Spanish a little better, I think that I would have included a glossary in the back of the book.
Another wonderful Pinkerton book. More so than the other book that I reviewed, this story adds a bit of non-fiction to the mix. In several other books the little girl comes home and shares some facts that she has learned in school that day. This time, she shares information about mammals. This leads to the rest of the story, during which the little girl's homework requires her to find some different mammals and birds. As they go through the book, actual names of birds and mammals are given as well as illustrations of them so that students could maybe find them on their own. One interesting thing that happens in this book is that, while they are searching in the woods for animals, they happen upon a group of hunters. Two things that were particularly interesting here were how they were portrayed and the fact that they actually shoot at things. The hunters are shown as being mean and a little ignorant. They are snarling and wanting to shoot at any and everything that moves. I have to wonder if this is showing a bias of the author? Perhaps Steven Kellogg looks down upon hunters and their activities. Also, there are a few illustrations in which the hunters are actually shooting up into a tree, and they shoot down Pinkerton in a hot air balloon. This might actually be kind of scary for students just because it really looks like they may have hit Pinkerton. They don't, but it still looks like it would have been a definite near miss. Also, i am always surprised when guns and bullets are shown in children's books. Granted the guns featured in this book look very old fashioned, but a gun is a gun. The saving grace for me though I suppose is showing the people using the guns in a negative light.
I rediscovered Steven Kellogg the other day in my block a class and quickly remembered Pinkerton. I think that I will for sure have to purchase all Pinkerton books for my own personal collection because I just love them. Yes there is a bias at play here, I love dogs. That really isn't the only reason though. These books are very entertaining and funny! That giant Great Dane puppy is always getting himself into some kind of mess. In this story, Pinkerton's owner decides that he must be lonely, so she goes to find him a friend. Finally, she comes upon a kitten named Rose. Instead of becoming friends though, Rose soon takes over as the resident dog while Pinkerton begins to act like a kitten. When Pinkerton's owners go to find out why this has happened, they unintentionally cause chaos at The International Pet Show. Pinkerton heads right for the kittens, while Rose heads for a parade of poodles who are none too pleased to see her. In the end, Pinkerton saves Rose from the herd of angry poodles and their masters and they become friends, resuming their roles as puppy and kitten.
Okay I set out to read what I am certain would have been a wonderful Eve Bunting novel this week, but I just couldn't. Not when Hush Hush had just come out on Thursday. In true book nerd fashion, I went out and bought this book the day after it came out because I have had my eye on it for several months now. I finished all 391 pages in a single evening, and to be honest I wish that I would have read it slower so that it would have lasted longer. This would have been impossible though as the action was just that fast paced. In this story we have Nora, an average teen with her fair share of emotional baggage and a best friend named Vee. Then there is Patch, a senior transfer student with a mysterious past and a love of dingy pool halls. The only thing Nora (and us) knows about him is that he seems to know just a little too much about her personal life and he has an enormous V shaped scar on his back. SPOILER: We come to find out as the book progresses that the scar on Patch's back is actually from when he was cast out of Heaven for falling in love with a human woman. For his love, he "fell" and has his wings ripped off (yikes I know!) After a long time wandering the earth miserable and alone, he discovers that he has two options. He can either take the life of a human and become human OR save a life and become their guardian angel. That person? Nora, naturally. If that wasn't complicated enough, Patch isn't the only one who may have it out for Nora. I cant tell you what happens in the end, but if you have been following my blog you know about my affinity for forbidden love, and could probably guess what Patch decides to do and why :-)
Like so many others, this book is started on the title and dedication pages. It sets up the tone of the book by first showing a small town at night, or at least before dawn and then it shows a sash, a flute and a hat. It makes you wonder what these things have in common. The story is about Jamie, a young Irish boy who is told that he is too young march in the St. Patrick's Day parade. So in an effort to prove them wrong, Jamie wakes up early and with his dog Nell, he walks the entire parade route. All the way, he is wearing his brother's sash, his father's hat and his mother's raincoat and playing a flute. Whenever something negative is said to him, his motto is "what do they know?"This is another one of those stories where another situation could be put in place of the one in the story. I mean, you could replace walking in the parade for making the dance team. Say a little girl is told she could never do it, but she tries out anyway and proves everyone wrong. When told the right way I feel like this story could be relatable to any child. Who among us has never been told that we couldn't do something, and like Jamie set out to prove yourself? It also sends a message to young children that they can do anything that they set their minds to. It's really an inspirational story.
When I first chose Eve Bunting as the focus of my project, I did not know why but she sounded familiar. As it turns out, it was this book. We probably read it in first or second grade, I think that it might have even been a big book. This is another of those books that I am glad to have gotten the chance to go back over. When I was little, my focus was art, and as such all I noticed in this book were the amazing illustrations. And while really I cant be blamed, I was missing out on a wonderful story. I think that what I like most about it is that it is written like a poem. It isn't wordy but it paints a detailed picture of what is happening in the story.
Okay, this is one of those books. Those books that you could read over and over again that I will for sure have to buy. It is about a swan who falls in love with a swan shaped boat named Dora. Through all the ridicule that he receives from his fellow pond-dwellers he loves her. The swan doesn't even leave her side when the winter comes then, and not to ruin it, when she is sunk, the swan dies with her. Now this is not just the romantic in me (I loved this book so much I made my boyfriend read it, when he had finished he looked up at me and said "yea you would like this book hunny") though it does tug at my heart strings to read a story of undying love. No, this story spoke to me on an entirely different level. On the surface this book is about a swan and his Dora, but below that lies a controversial issue. The swans in this story could easily be swapped for a modern day homosexual couple. Everyone tries to tell them that their love is wrong, but it makes no difference to them. In the same way, you could insert a multi-racial couple, again people would likely frown on this union, but it doesn't matter. It is summed up nicely in several quotes that must be shared.
You've heard that a picture is worth a thousand words? Well that really describes this book well, being that it is a book of few words. Funny as it sounds, the lack of words really doesn't impede the story at all. Don't get me wrong, its simple but strong. The story begins on the cover pages, where you see a rooster rushing out of a barn flapping his wings. On the first page with text, the rooster yells "Hurry! Hurry!" to the goats. Then the goat goes and tells the next animal and so on, until at the very last we finally learn what was so important. The hen had laid an egg, and the chick was about to hatch. Once I thought about it, it really flowed. I thought that also this book could be used to breach the topic of a new baby in the family for students. All the barnyard animals are so happy to meet the new baby chick, and that would be a good message that could carry over to new brothers and/or sisters.
I must say that after having read this book, I have no idea where the controversy is exactly. Is it that it deals with death a couple of times? Is it the inter-racial dating? The gay characters? Or is it because it touches on the topic of bullying in schools? I'm going to go with all of the above. Funny thing is though that some of the topics have become less taboo and some of them have become more. Death is something that will always be hard, but by and large people are not stunned to read about it anymore. That does not mean that parents want their kids reading about it though. Especially when it is dealt with in such a reasonable way as it is in this book. The inter-racial couple, Addie and DuShawn? It would have been very looked down upon at one point, but now? Not so much. It really isn't so unusual to see a couple walking down the street, one Black one White. Bullying is something that parents may still frown upon their children reading about. Simply because it is one of the uglier sides of childhood that so many parents would rather not address, not unlike death. Probably the biggest stitch in people's sides about The Misfits is that there is not one, but two gay characters. To add to this, Joe's parents fully accept him, and so do his friends. The only people who do not understand and ridicule are the other students who do not know Joe, or Colin for that matter. This would be more of an issue now because of course with the issue of gay marriage coming to the forefront these days. It seems that the line between anti and pro has been clearly drawn. As such, it would follow that when it comes to literature that deals with homosexuality, the line would be equally as hard. It should not be this way though. Children need exposure to all people in all walks of life so that they can grow up to be well rounded adults. Further more, this is an important read because it shows homosexuals being accepted, not shunned. This would be an important thing for students to see, along with the eventual acceptance of those who were labeled as Addie and Bobby were. I for sure agree with everything that the book has to say, and the lessons that it has to teach. I did have some beef though with the ending.
I havent really thought about The Giver since I first read it in middle school. That is through no fault of the book though. I really didnt like the book back then simply because I hated every book I was made to read in school. I do remember though that it was very touching, I may have cried at the end when he decided to take Gabe with him and escape. That having been said, I am sure thinking about it now. I had no idea really what I was missing out on while I was just going through the motions back in fifth grade and I am really glad that I have been given the opportunity to go back and revisit this book. That having been said, I have to say that despite not being awake the first time through, I am so much more disturbed this time around that I was last time and a little creeped out to be honest. Really I do not remember having it ever occur to me that being "released" meant dying. Actually, it seems a little silly, but even as I read it this time I guess that I figured people who were released got to go off into the real world. That is until we really talked about it in class, and of course when Jonas begins to suspect what it means. The idea of this though, that because you do not fit into their perfect world, you must not be worthy of living. It reminds of the holocaust actually. Think about it, Hitler thought that anyone who did not fit into his view of what a perfect society was, they shouldn't be allowed to exist. It wasn't just Jewish people either, it was homosexuals and gypsies and a whole bunch of other people who were persecuted just because they didn't fit into his view. Something else that I thought about was just what it must be like to live in a world without color. I don't just think its because I have an art specialization that I simply cant picture this, it is as a person that the thought depresses me. Very much like in the move Pleasentville, before it was turned up side down, it was boring. Think about experiencing it for the first time like Jonas did with the apple. On another semi-related note, why an apple in the first place? I think I smell a Biblical reference here. Apples are the forbidden fruit, just as seeing things in color is forbidden in Jonas' world. I don't think it is any wonder the first forbidden object and the first flash of taboo color is the original forbidden fruit.
Interesting thing, the copy of the book that I have doesn't say "a ghost story", instead it just says "a novel". I feel like this is more fitting because when I think of a ghost story, I think of something scary, but this was not scary. Which was okay because I wasn't really looking for a scary story when I picked this up. So if that is what you are going for here, guess again. I think that one of the most interesting parts about this book was hearing the main character's descriptions of things that I have seen in New Orleans. Granted it was a very long time ago, but hearing her discuss Lafayette Cemetery and the French Quarter brought back foggy memories. It even dug up memories of Mardi Gras beads and king's cake (I do miss that cake). It was also an interesting history lesson in a way, not all of it was true of course. If anything though really, it made me want to learn more about the area that I frequented when I was very little. This having been said, I was a little disappointed with this book. I feel like the only character that got any dimension to her was the ghost. I would have also really appreciated the love story developing up a little bit, but every time Anton comes up, Rebeca becomes distracted by the ghost. I almost got tired of hearing about her. I also feel like she didn't respond normally to the ghost. I know if I figured out I had met a ghost, I would probably stay away from her, but she decides to go back into the cemetery in the dead of night and find her again. Pure insanity. That is just me though. In the end, it was plenty entertaining and after it got going, it was a very quick read that kept you curious until the end. It also had a twist in the end that I enjoyed, even though I really should have seen it coming.
Just as in Leslea Newman's other book, Mommy, Mama and Me, it is a short easy read aimed at younger students. The message there is the same here and that is that even though this family has two daddies it is still a good family. One thing that I noticed here that I didn't so much in the other book though is that it messes with gender perceptions a little. For example, there is a scene where the little boy's daddy is showing him how to sew. On another page daddy brews a pot of tea and papa sets up a tea party for the little boy and his bear. I just have to point this out because it seemed a little odd to me. Meaning that I had to wonder if this book were about a family with a mom and a dad, would the dad have been brewing tea, or would it have been the mom? Or are those pictures there because we have a preconceived notion that gay men all sew and brew tea? Or is it me that has the preconceived notion of a man in a heterosexual marriage? The only thing I really know is that in every other book I have read with families in it, the dad was an average lawn mowing, sports watching Joe. Just something to think about.
Along with Gloria Goes to Gay Pride, this is probably the most informative of the books, and also one of the most helpful. This book could not only be read for discussion but to help students understand a classmate's family. It also shows an example of discrimination and how it could be dealt with in the classroom. Or I should say, it gives an example of discrimination in the classroom. I was actually a little upset with how the teacher handled or didn't handle it when Tommy teased Molly about having two mommies. The teacher didn't chastise Tommy for it, she didn't tell him that it was okay to have two mommies, just like its okay to have only a mommy or only a daddy. I fee like I would have turned this into a teachable moment for the whole class. If there wouldn't have been time just then, I would have taken time out to explain to the students that families come in all different shapes and sizes. No one family is right or wrong they are just different, and different is okay. I did like the pictures however. They added to the story by making a visualization of what was going on. I liked how it showed Molly's family and her life with her two mommies so that students could make the connection that it looked like their room, or hey they have puppy. Also, I like how it takes place in a classroom. Another way that it is relatable for children.
