Posted in Historical Fiction on March 27, 2008 | Leave a Comment »
Dorris, Michael. 1992. Morning Girl. New York: Hyperion Books.
Morning Girl and Star Boy live a simple life; they share a hut with their mother and father, spending their days and nights traversing paths that bring them a better understanding of human nature, and closer to a time that will shake the foundation of their world.
Dorris’s [...]
Posted in Cont. Realistic Fiction on March 22, 2008 | Leave a Comment »
Birdsall, Jeanne. 2005. The Penderwicks: A Summer Tale of Four Sisters, Two Rabbits, and a Very Interesting Boy. New York: Yearling.
The Penderwick sisters expect different things out of their summer vacation, but not one of them could have imagined the fun adventures and many troubles they’d find themselves carrying out, or how that one summer [...]
Posted in Cont. Realistic Fiction on March 17, 2008 | Leave a Comment »
McDonald, Megan. 2000. Judy Moody. Illustrated by Peter H. Reynolds. Cambridge, MA: Candlewick Press.
Judy Moody is not looking forward to her first day back to school; she knows that things will be different, that she may not get to sit next to her best friend even, and that puts her in a bad mood. Her [...]
Posted in Cont. Realistic Fiction on March 15, 2008 | Leave a Comment »
Balliett, Blue. 2006. The Wright 3. Illustrated by Brett Helquist. New York: Scholastic Press.
Frank Lloyd Wright’s Robie House stood in Hyde Park before Petra, Calder and Tommy were even born, but during their sixth grade year the architectural marvel is in danger of being dismantled. The three friends decide that such a crime cannot be [...]
Posted in Poetry for Children on March 8, 2008 | Leave a Comment »
George, Kristine O’Connell. 2002. Little Dog and Duncan. Illustrated by June Otani. New York: Clarion Books.
Duncan comes to visit Little Dog in this series of poems by Kristine O’Connell George.
The narrator of these poems may be a little girl, but they certainly capture a dog’s mentality; in that respect, they are short, almost choppy takes [...]
Posted in Poetry for Children on March 7, 2008 | Leave a Comment »
Selected by Alma Flor Ada and F. Isabel Campoy. 2003. !Pio Peep!: Traditional Spanish Nursery Rhymes. Illustrated by Vivi Escriva. English Adaptations by Alice Schertle. New York: HarperCollins Publishers.
!Pio Peep! is lovely collection of Spanish nursery rhymes for children, but also for older students just learning the language, or for ESL students. The side by [...]
Posted in Poetry for Children on March 7, 2008 | Leave a Comment »
Selected by Mary Ann Hoberman. 1994. My Song is Beautiful: Poems and Pictures in Many Voices. New York: Little, Brown and Company.
Bringing together various cultures, poets and illustrators, Hoberman tied the collection in My Song is Beautiful together with the themes of self-esteem and personal power. Each poem reflects on the individual, encouraging children to [...]
Posted in Poetry for Children on March 7, 2008 | Leave a Comment »
Collected by Jane Yolen and Andrew Fusek Peters. 2007. Here’s a Little Poem: A Very First Book of Poetry. Illustrated by Polly Dunbar. Cambridge, MA: Candlewick Press.
Yolen and Peters have assembled a collection that includes perennial children’s favorites such as A.A. Milne, Rosemary Wells and Jack Prelutsky, while exposing children to the work of classics [...]
Posted in Poetry for Children on March 6, 2008 | Leave a Comment »
Kuskin, Karla. 2005. Toots the Cat: Poems. Illustrated by Lisze Bechtold. New York: Henry Holt and Company.
In Toots the Cat, Kuskin has created a series of poems that tells the story of a cat who comes to visit, but ends up staying.
Capturing the essence of the animal in poems such as “Toots’s Ears” and “Hunting,” [...]
