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All posts for the month June, 2013

The Paper Crane, by Molly Bang

Published June 5, 2013 by Dagmar

the paper craneThis book never fails to please my students.  I usually read it to second or third graders, but it can be enjoyed by older students as well.

This is a story of a man who owned a restaurant on a busy road.  He loved owning his restaurant and had many customers, until a new highway was built.  Travelers no longer passed by, and the restaurant was empty.  One evening, a stranger wearing old and worn clothes comes to the restaurant.  Although the restaurant owner is very poor, he feeds the stranger. The stranger repays the kindness of the restaurant owner by folding a napkin into a paper crane.  He tells the restaurant owner that when he claps his hands, the crane will come to life and dance.  Sure enough, it works.  The crane dances.  People come from all around to see the dancing crane and soon the restaurant is busy again. One day, the stranger returns and takes out a flute.  The crane comes to life and goes to him.  Together, they leave the restaurant.  The stranger and his crane are never seen again, but travelers still come to the restaurant to hear the story of the stranger and the crane.

The illustrations are cut paper collage.  This book is the winner of the Boston Globe-Horn Book Award for illustration (1986).

Wonder, by R. J. Palacio

Published June 3, 2013 by Dagmar

121009_DX_WonderBook.jpg.CROP.article250-mediumI wasn’t sure what to make of Wonder when I started it.  In fact, I put it down for a while thinking it would be a cliched story of a person living with a disability, bullied by others.  This book is so much richer and more thoughtful than I first thought.  I was inspired to give it another try after my students talked about it at school and after my son recommended it to me after it was recommended it to him by a friend.

August is a fifth grader who has been homeschooled until fifth grade because he suffers from severe birth defects that have deformed his face.  All his life, people have gawked at him, laughed at him, been scared of him or have otherwise been unkind.  August’s parents think he should go to a real school and learn to build friendships.  August begins fifth grade at a private school.  His entry into school is rough.  There are only a few kids who will take the social risk to befriend him.

The book moves along well, because each chapter is told from the point of view of another character.  You hear not only from August, but also from his sister Olivia, her boyfriend Justin, her good friend Miranda and August’s best friends Summer and Jack.  Each person has their own story to tell.

I was moved to tears several times in this book.  It’s really well done.  Highly recommended to tweens and middle school readers.

One Crazy Summer, by Rita Williams-Garcia

Published June 2, 2013 by Dagmar

OCSOne Crazy Summer is an incredible book – not only because much of the book takes place just blocks from my school library in North Oakland, CA – but because the main character, Delphine, is a strong and capable 11 year old girl who really knows how to make the best of a bad situation.  I love her strength and her determination.  This book ran like wildfire around my school.

Delphine, Vonetta and Fern are three girls, 11, 9 and 7, who live with their father and Big Ma, their grandmother, in Brooklyn, NY.  Their mother, Cecile abandoned them when Fern was just a baby.  One summer, the girl’s father says the girls need to know their mother and sends them across the country to stay with their mother in Oakland, CA.  The girls, who don’t know their mother at all, are greeted by Cecile at the airport.  Cecile not only doesn’t hug them, when she takes them home, she doesn’t cook for them or care for them in any way.  Cecile sends them off every day to get their breakfast from the Black Panthers kitchen in the neighborhood and tells the girls to spend the day in the Black Panthers’ summer camp.  The girls learn all about revolution but also that the Black Panthers feed hungry people.  They also discover that their mother, a poet with a printing press, has been asked to print the Black Panther newsletter.

Delphine rises to the occasion.  She rejects her mother’s call to eat Chinese food every night and goes to the store so she can cook meals for her sisters.  She even plans an excursion into San Francisco so that the girls can actually see something of California, not just “poor people in Oakland”.  Delphine is smart. You just can’t help routing her on and hoping that her mother can see all the good that we see in her.

This book is a window into the world of the 1960s and those who believed in the work of the Black Panthers and those in the black community who saw things differently.  Delphine is forced to view both worlds, that of her father and grandma and that of her mother Cecile.  What a great book.  But, don’t just believe me.  This book won the Scott O’Dell Award for Historical Fiction, the Coretta Scott King Award and a Newbery Honor and National Book Award Honor.  Don’t miss it.

I’m excited to read Rita Williams-Garcia’s new book, P.S. Be Eleven.

Velma Gratch & the Way Cool Butterfly by Alan Madison

Published June 1, 2013 by Dagmar

the way cool butterflyVelma is in first grade.  Unfortunately, Velma is the third of the Gratch sisters.  Even more unfortunately, both of Velma’s older sisters were incredibly memorable.  They were perfect.  Velma is constantly reminded of how wonderful her sisters were while no one seems to remember her name.  Velma decides she wants to be remembered, too.

When Velma’s class goes on a field trip to the butterfly conservatory, Velma finds out that her sisters never went there.  Velma waits and waits for something memorable to happen to her at the conservatory.  Then, something does.  A beautiful monarch butterfly lands on her finger…and stays there.  The butterfly stays and stays on Velma’s finger long after they’ve left the conservatory.  Finally, Velma’s principal says, “no one will forget this.”  Velma realizes that monarch needs to start its “my-gray-sun”.  Velma knows just how to make the monarch leave her finger and takes her monarch to the park.

This book drew applause from my second graders.  It’s a great story about rooting for the underdog.  The illustrations by Kevin Hawkes are really nice.  This was chosen as a School Library Journal Best Book of the Year.