Archive for 2012

First Girl Scout: The Life of Juliette Gordon Low

Written by Ginger Wadsworth

This engaging biography of Juliette Gordon Low will have special meaning for all current and former Girl Scouts, but it is well worth the time of all students. Daisy, as she was called, lived during a fascinating time in history, and she really did live life to the fullest. The author vividly depicts the living conditions and concerns throughout Daisy’s life. The reader learns a lot about her personality and some of her motivations.

Daisy was born shortly before the beginning of the Civil War in Savannah, Georgia. Her mother was from the North. Both families were prominent, so frequent guests at the home included General Sherman and President Taft. Daisy was well-educated, nearly deaf, and married to an Englishman. She knew royalty and had close encounters with danger due to her frequent travels during war and peace. She met Lord Robert Baden-Powell through friends in London. He was forming a group called Boy Scouts, and Daisy thought that sounded great for girls too. She would form a group of girl guides then promptly tell someone else to take over. But she stuck with the idea and started the movement in the US. At her death from breast cancer, there were millions of Girl Scouts worldwide.

Named to the 2013 Amelia Bloomer List by the American Library Association, this well-research and well-presented biography is perfect for fourth graders learning about research or about this period of history. The author’s excellent website, www.gingerwadsworth.com, has an eight-page teacher’s guide with many reading activities. This is also a great source to increase reading comprehension and literacy skills.

  •  First Girl ScoutTitle: First Girl Scout: The Life of Juliette Gordon Low
  • Author: Ginger Wadsworth
  • Publisher: Clarion Books/Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 2012
  • Reviewer: Sue Poduska
  • Format: Hardcover, 224 pages
  • Genre: Biography, Civil War, First World War
  • ISBN: 978-0-547-24394-8
  • Extras: Table of contents, timeline, source notes, bibliography, list of places to visit, index

Wonder

Written by R.J. Palacio

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Auggie is not normal. At least his appearance isn’t. But his emotions and his intelligence are. Due to a genetic anomaly, August Pullman is born with no jaw, no ears as we know them, and misplaced facial features. His appearance, coupled with multiple surgeries, means that he’s home schooled until he’s ready for fifth grade. He’s gotten very good at noticing the reaction to his unusual appearance and moving on, but it’s not always easy. When his parents get him into a private middle school, he’s faced with a whole new set of challenges. The author has mastered the art of showing the many sides of an issue. Although Auggie is the main focus, we get to hear how his sister and some of the other kids view the situation. There are no huge surprises in the plot, but what is surprising is the depth of the characters and the abilities they discover. Even the principal discovers his own compassion, with tears on his face at one point.

Fourth graders and up will love the humor and identify with the bullying that happens. Before Auggie even gets to the school, his parents have him laughing about the principal, Mr. Tuchman’s name by saying their professor, Miss Butt. Perfect fourth grade humor. Kids will learn a little about genetics and facial deformity while enhancing their literacy skills. Among other awards, this debut novel was named an Amazon Best Books of the Month for Kids, 2012.

  • WonderTitle: Wonder
  • Author: R.J. Palacio
  • Publisher: Alfred A. Knopf/Random House, 2012
  • Reviewer: Sue Poduska
  • Format: Hardcover, 316 pages
  • Genre: Contemporary fiction, friendship, physical challenges
  • ISBN: 978-0-375-86902-0
  • Lexile: 790L

Otter Lee Brave

Written by Rena Cherry Brown

Illustrated by Mikaila Maidment

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Otter Lee Brave. My first thought was, “This is such an adorable cover. The otters are just the sweetest little fellows. I’m sure this will be an cute story about otters.” Then, I said the title again – Otter Lee Brave, Utter Lee Brave, Utterly Brave. Odd, yet interesting. I am hooked, and I have to read this book, and I feel sure 4th graders will as well.

Upon reading the story, it becomes very evident that Otter Lee Brave is so much more than just a sweet story about cute creatures. Rena Cherry Brown creates several plot points that will teach the reader many lessons. Throughout the story, Lee learns to be brave in all circumstances. First, he tries diving to the bottom of the bay for the first time, with his mom gently encouraging him. Next, Lee learns how to comfort himself in times of trouble. When Lee is picked up and taken to an aquarium, he learns to adapt to the situation. While Lee is bullied by a large otter in the aquarium, he is also adopted by an older female, learning the good and bad of characters in life. An earthquake causes the aquarium to bust open and all the otters are swept into the bay. While they are not equipped with open water survival skills, Lee teaches them how to hold on to kelp to prevent them from floating away. There he learns to be a leader. Even when the bully is in trouble, and Lee is the only one who knows and can save him, Lee considers the actions he could take and ultimately decides to save the bully otter learning bravery. And, like all good otter stories, Lee stays in the bay and makes a connection with a female otter – and they live happily every after I assume. He is Otter Lee Brave.

The story is interesting, but the illustrations are fabulous. Mikaila Maidment uses each page to bring life to the book. You feel the tenderness of motherly love. You feel the security a kelp bed can give and the sadness of the loss of a loved one. You feel the anxiousness of a new environment. You feel the weakness of being bullied. You feel the fear of the unknown. You feel the hope for a future. You feel young love at the end. All of these feelings come from the amazing artwork of Maidment.

Within the story line, readers gain small facts about the otter world, such as what their environment is like, what their diet consists of, and what obstacles and predators they must avoid. The last page contains a list of “Otter Facts.” The story, lessons learned, facts and illustrations all combine for an increased level of reading comprehension for readers of all ages.

  • Otter Lee BraveTitle: Otter Lee Brave
  • Author: Rena Cherry Brown
  • Illustrator: Mikaila Maidment
  • Publisher: Shiffer Publishing
  • Reviewer: Ann H. Norris
  • ISBN:0764341553
  • Hardback, 48 pages
  • Genre: Nature, Animals
  • Lexile: 870

Wisdom, the Midway Albatross: Surviving the Japanese Tsunami and Other Disasters for Over 60 Years

Written by Darcy Pattison

Illustrated by Kitty Harvill

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Wisdom’s life is a remarkable story, at times touching and suspenseful, but ultimately inspiring.  Survival is hard enough for a Laysan Albatross.  Wisdom was one of many chicks born that year on Midway Atoll, but few survived long enough to fly.  That was the first hurdle for this little chick.  She took to the skies, flying and catching food from the sea for years.  She endured predators, such as sharks and natural phenomenon, such as tsunami, but returned to Midway in 1956.  That year she mated and laid an egg.  We know that because a research scientist caught her and banded her that year.  Through this study, Wisdom’s life is documented.  Not only did she endure the normal circumstances that threaten birds, now she faced death from manmade causes.  Many birds became victims of eating plastic that appeared in the ocean.  Some got caught in longline fishing lines and were trapped.  When her band was checked in 2002, scientists were so impressed by her longevity that they gave her a name: Wisdom.  They documented her laying an egg each year from 2008 through 2011.  But that year, not only did a big storm hit, a tsunami flooded the island.  Many albatrosses were killed.  Scientists worried about Wisdom and her chick.  For nearly ten days, no one saw her until they finally spotted her feeding her chick safe in their nest.

Readers can’t help but cheer for the tough, beautiful bird.  Students could listen and list the different threats to Wisdom’s survival as a literacy activity.  It would make a great class read aloud for both environmental and animal units.  The soft watercolor illustrations are a lovely accompaniment to the text.  There is a book trailer on the author’s website which will be a quick introduction to the book: (http://albatross.darcypattison.com/). The U. S. Fish and Wildlife service has frequent “Wisdom” updates at: (http://www.fws.gov/midway/whatsnew.html).

  • WisdomTITLE: Wisdom, the Midway Albatross: Surviving the Japanese Tsunami and Other Disasters for Over 60 Years
  • AUTHOR: Darcy Pattison
  • ILLUSTRATOR: Kitty Harvill
  • PUBLISHER: Mims House, 2012
  • REVIEWER: Risa Brown
  • EDITION: Paperback, 32 p.
  • ISBN: 978-0-9798621-7-5
  • GENRE: Non-fiction, animal stories
  • LEXILE: 840

Candy Experiments

Written by Loralee Leavitt

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Explosions, lightening, secrets… what reader on the fourth grade level could resist a book that gives recipes for causing, creating, or discovering all that? Top that fun with a bunch of candy – literally – and Candy Experiments is sure to please! Science fanatics are sure to gobble up this book.

In bright candy-colors, this Candy Experiments offers 70 kid-friendly experiments each conducted with – you guessed it – candy. Each test begins with a short teaser, such as, “Can you make marshmallows dance without touching them?” All experiments include basic information in three consistent subheadings: what you need, what to do, what’s happening. This organized presentation will help readers with comprehension of the material. Skill levels are labeled: easy, medium, advanced or get a grown up. Most of the required supplies and equipment are easy-to-access candy or household materials. A few experiments, however, rely on specialized equipment such as a FoodSaver vacuum sealer.

The experiments themselves address a wide variety of science concepts, including density, solubility, and acidity. While a few of the experiments will be too simple to challenge readers on the fourth grade level (melting candy in water) and some feel a bit contrived (reading food labels to see how much “candy” they include), most of the experiments will appeal to candy-happy kids. The scientific explanations are presented in a chatty voice and focus on comprehension. Candy Experiments contains content rich vocabulary (such as molecule, crystals, geologist, air pressure, and even chromatography), but without definition. Although there is a useful index, no glossary is included.

Candy Experiments is a cross-over book which will have appeal in both the classroom and the home. The depth and diversity of science concepts and skills demonstrated makes it a good compliment to school curriculum; yet it is so much fun that children will also read it for pleasure. The book provides an engaging example of expository informative text and could be used by teachers implementing the Common Core State Standards. If used with small groups of students, the step-by-step nature of the text lends itself to read aloud practice. Candy Experiments is a clever combination of fun and learning. Readers will be hooked by melting, bubbling, or bursting their favorite treat while discovering important scientific concepts!

  • Candy ExperimentsTITLE: Candy Experiments
  • AUTHOR: Loralee Leavitt
  • PUBLISHER: Andrews McMeel Publishing
  • REVIEWER: Heather L. Montgomery
  • EDITION: Paperback: 160 p.
  • ISBN: 978-1449418366
  • GENRE: Nonfiction, Science
  • LEXILE: 1040

David Karp: The Mastermind behind Tumblr

Written by Karen Latchana Kenney

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In an age when everyone has at least five email addresses and many people have a personal blogs, some applications and websites continue to outshine all the others. Tumblr is right up there with Facebook and Microsoft in name recognition, at least among those familiar with coding. Tumblr is described as a short-form blog in which the owner can post pictures, chats, or songs – more than Twitter and less than Facebook. Even as a child, David Karp, Tumblr’s founder, showed amazing talent for programming and for coming up with innovative ideas. He worked as an intern at the age of fourteen and had his first real job at UrbanBaby at sixteen. Because of his age, he avoided contact with those he worked with and even secretly worked for a New York company from Tokyo for a while. With the money David made at UrbanBaby, he was able to start his own company, Davidville. Tumblr was launched as part of this company in February 2007. Today, with over 50 billion entries, it’s grown into a major force on the internet.

Written at a fourth grade reading level, the text chronicles the career of a man who was very young when he started taking the world by storm. That fact alone should appeal to kids. This is a part of series called “Gateway Biographies,” with an interesting collection of inspiring people. For added value, the author includes a table of contents, timeline, source notes, bibliography, web sources, and index. Kids curious about the internet can easily create reading activities with the sources listed and a little supervision.

  • David KarpTITLE: David Karp: The Mastermind behind Tumblr
  • AUTHOR: Karen Latchana Kenney
  • PUBLISHER: Lerner Publications Company
  • REVIEWER: Sue Poduska
  • EDITION: Hardback, 2013
  • ISBN: 978-1-4677-1285-9
  • GENRE: Biography, Internet
  • LEXILE: 740

SPI : Shadow Paranormal Investigators – The Case of the Dark Shadow

Written by T.J. Bonham 

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SPI The Case of the Dark Shadow is an intriguing story for 4th through 6th graders interested in mystery. The book offers the 4th grade reader some challenging language and an unusual plot, but older readers should have no problem with the language and comprehension of this paranormal mystery.

The story grabs the reader from the first chapter by describing emotions common to students who have experienced loss, change, and the fear of starting at a new school. This will offer teachers many opportunities to discuss coping mechanisms for students.

The rest of the story is full of mystery and fun as the character and her friends battle a sinister dark shadow that threatens to harm a ghost hunter and her family. Interwoven in the mystery of the dark shadow is the emotional side of living with a parent deployed during war, another real life situation that kids this age are living with.

A book for middle grade readers that includes real life situations that engage the reader will only serve to encourage students to keep reading, but a book that also includes “outside the box” topics, like ghosts and the paranormal, can broaden their scope of interest and be just what the teacher ordered for the reluctant reader. Teachers can use this as a classroom book read aloud or together because of the topic, the mystery, and the overall interest to boys or girls.

SPI would be a great addition to the 4th to 6th grade classroom library. The book can be used as an adjunct to reading advancement, comprehension, and writing lessons for students in these grades, making it useful for teachers working with state reading guidelines. And books that have excellent plots and story lines are always appreciated by teachers who prepare students for state testing involving reading passages for comprehension and understanding.

  • SPITitle: SPI:Shadow Paranormal Investigators (The Case of the Dark Shadow)
  • Author: T.J. Bonham
  • Publisher: Schiffer Publishing,Ltd.
  • ISBN: 978-0-7643-4132-8
  • Pages: 111
  • Reviewer: Terri Forehand
  • Lexile: 810

Pip and the Wood Witch Curse: A Spindlewood Tale (Book One)

Written and Illustrated by Chris Mould

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Book One of the “Spindlewood Tales,” is the exciting and gripping adventure of an abused orphan, Pip. About to be sold, literally, to a ship’s captain, Pip seizes the opportunity to escape, only to land in a worse situation. Pip is delivered into the legendary village of Hangman’s Hollow, where the townspeople and the creatures of the forest fight over possession of the children. Children are forced to hide lest they be imprisoned by the forest dwellers. When Pip trudges through a heavy snow, his tracks set in motion a whole series of events: chases through the city streets and through the woods, flying accusations, and battles. He wanders past the local tavern, where the tavern keeper snatches him, keeps him safe, and introduces him to his own son. Pip and the son, Toad, set out to rescue a girl rumored to be hiding.

For timid fourth-graders this may be best as a read-aloud since the subject matter is a bit scary. But it should be fine for most independent fourth-grade readers. While Pip and Toad venture forth with little trepidation, they do encounter girl who is paralyzed by terror. However, readers can learn lessons. Things can always be worse, and they can always work at improving their own situations. Also, it seems that even the most innocuous objects can be malevolent. The trees harbor witches. A wooden doll is in fact a malicious soldier from the civil war. Even the birds–though not all of them–report back to the evil creatures.

The author-illustrator presents some beautiful and vivid drawings of the settings and many of the characters. They add a lot to the feel of being there.

  • Title: Pip and the Wood Witch: A Spindlewood Tale Book One
  • Author: Chris Mould
  • Publisher: Albert Whitman & Company
  • Reviewer: Sue Poduska
  • Hardcover: 155 pages
  • ISBN: 0807565482
  • Genre: Fantasy
  • Lexile: 720L

Robbers! True Stories of the World’s Most Notorious Thieves

Written by Andreas Schroeder

Illustrated by Remy Simard

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Readers on the 4th grade reading level and up who like adventure and action will enjoy the drama and intrigue in Robbers! True Stories of the World’s Most Notorious Thieves! Presented  in chapters this 166-page text provides stories of famous historical robberies. Each chapter presents one robber, an in-depth look at one of their heists, and briefer descriptions of their other crimes. From a team of thieves who stole the Mona Lisa to an individual who hijacked a plane and parachuted as an escape, Robbers! illustrates the creative approaches criminals have taken.

But Robbers! doesn’t only highlight illegal successes. Through stories of criminal mistakes, such as a pair of thieves who didn’t know how to fly their get-away plane to a team who forgot to run the dishwasher (and thus left numerous fingerprints for police to use), this book shows how crooks get caught. Robbers! details criminal techniques such as how to case a bank, how to run pearls over your teeth to determine if they are genuine or fake, and how to act your way through a situation to bluff authority figures. This is information some adults may not want in the hands of young readers so this book might not end up on third grade reading lists; on the other hand, the stories do teach the values of attention to detail, careful work and determination and the book might intrigue risk-seeking students who need practice with their reading skills. A book that highlights criminal action could glorify the thieves or show them as villains. Robbers!, however, presents these histories with a non-judgemental tone. The book concludes with a robber-turned-good – the story of Willie Sutton, a bank-robbing addict who eventually turned his energies to helping banks improve their security.

Each story is accompanied by brief cartoon-style illustrations placed in-line with the text. This presentation style requires the cartoon caption to be read as a part of the main text and may confuse some readers, but the illustrations themselves help lighten the book. Every spread includes at least one illustration and some pages include a call out note with additional information. Backmatter includes a chapter-by-chapter bibliography, an index and further reading. Unfortunately all of the books listed in the further reading are at least twenty years old, so may be out-dated and hard for young readers to access.

  • RobbersTITLE: Robbers! True Stories of the World’s Most Notorious Thieves
  • AUTHOR: Andreas Schroeder
  • ILLUSTRATOR: Remy Simard
  • PUBLISHER: Annick Press
  • REVIEWER: Heather L. Montgomery
  • EDITION: Paperback: 166 p.
  • ISBN: 978-1554514403
  • GENRE: Nonfiction, History
  • LEXILE: 1230GN

Greenhorn

Written by Anna Olswanger

Illustrated by Miriam Nerlove

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Imagine being an elementary school boy. You are forced to move to a new country. You are thrown into a boarding type school. You know no one. You have no family. You have only one possession.  You are a Holocaust survivor.

Now imagine again being an elementary school boy. You attend a boarding school filled with bullies. You talk about your father all the time. You have a significant speech impediment.

You just met Daniel and Aaron.

Greenhorn is a short read at only forty-eight pages, but huge issues are found within those pages. While it seems that the Holocaust would be a major theme here, it really comes across as just a background issue. The more intricate themes are about bullying, belonging, self-discovery and friendship.

What is brought forth immediately, and throughout the book, is the name calling and bullying that was common for the 1940’s Brooklyn. I was taken back by this while in the read, but after realizing that is what life was like in that time, it came together for me. Linked, as a result of the bullying from other students, Aaron (has a speech impediment) and Daniel (the Holocaust survivor) find a friendship. Its that sense of belonging in a group that helps these characters survive their time within the school.

I can’t divulge what’s in the box. No spoiler alert here. Just read the book.

Not being Jewish, or knowing much about the Jewish culture, I found it hard to understand many of the words used. However, there is a vocabulary list of these words and I would strongly recommend having the students learn those before reading. It will definitely enhance the readers comprehension of the events. The illustrations enhance the reading material and give fourth grade readers a nice break within the pages. The publisher, NewSouth, has made an extensive Discussion Guide for families and Classroom Guide for teachers (http://www.newsouthbooks.com/greenhorn). When you are ready to introduce the Holocaust to your students, Greenhorn will bring the students in gently.

  • GreenhornTitle: Greenhorn
  • Author: Anna Olswanger
  • Illustrator: Miriam Nerlove
  • Publisher: NewSouth Books
  • Reviewer: Ann H. Norris
  • ISBN: 1588382354
  • Edition: Hardback, 48 pages
  • Genre: History, Relationships
  • Lexile: 870
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