Weedflower

Title: Weedflower
Author: Cynthia Kadohata
Required Multicultural Text

     I thought this book was very good and brought out a lot of emotions from me as a reader.  Sumiko, a twelve-year-old Japanese-American girl living in California on a flower farm, experiences a dramatic change in her life after the attack on Pearl Harbor.  Before the attack, she lived with her family and enjoyed working on the farm all day, though she did not have any friends at school.  She seemed happy enough with her life and the responsibilities she had in the house, but an emptiness of acceptance at school.  After the attack, her life is turned upside down as some family members are taken away, and they are all stripped of their Japanese heritage.  Even though she thought of herself as the most American in the family and she hated working on her Japanese writing, it was not easy to give it up.  This little girl went through a lot of hardships just to get to this place, and then she and her family were shipped into internment camps.  In the camps, life was unthinkably worse than she had ever thought possible.  However, Sumiko continued to look after her brother and help her family, and she also made a real friend for the first time.  I loved this little friendship in the story and how the little Mohave boy on the Native American reservation liked the Japanese girl who brought him ice.  I do wish there was more to this story and more explanation about what happens with their friendship even after Sumiko is able to leave the camp.  Overall, I really enjoyed this book, even the sad parts which were frequent.  To me it is a wealth of new information about this time in our country and what terrible conditions we put all these innocent people in to live.  It is terrible, but that is just from looking back now, at the time I'm sure a lot of people thought these were necessary precautions that might save the country, and though it sounds harsh now, who can say I wouldn't have thought the same in those circumstances.  I think this book can be used in higher level classes to help students understand this part of history that is barely taught.

Shipwreck

Title: Shipwreck (Island Book One)

Author: Gordon Korman

Genre Study: Contemporary Realistic Fiction grade level 3-5

     Set in present day times, six kids are sent to the Charting a New Course program where they must work on a large ship sailing to Guam.  Each individual has different reasons for being sentenced to this experience by their parents.  Some are avoiding jail time, some watch too much TV, some have had mental breakdowns, and so-on.  While they are on the large ship called the Phoenix, they must do many intense manual labor tasks as the captain and mate order.  Life is miserable for these kids on this ship, especially when they hit a bad storm.  When the captain is lost and then the first mate abandons the six children, they must work together to man the ship by themselves and try to survive. 
     This is the first book of a series, and so my hope is that the next books continue to improve on the story because I found myself bored with the plot line.  In a lot of ways I found this story to relate to the book/movie Holes.  Both stories about a young boy who innocently gets caught in a crime and is sent to an alternative program than jail.  At the camp or program they meet other kids who have their own home life issues and they must work together toward a goal despite the adult figures of the program.  It is a decent story, and is fairly quick, written in a journal type format minus the first-person voice which personally I think would be beneficial for this book.  However, I do think this book and series may interest boys around fourth grade so it could be useful in the classroom.

Leon's Story

Title: Leon's Story
Author: Leon Walter Tillage
Required Multicultural Text

     This is a man's autobiographical story of his childhood, growing up black in North Carolina before and during the Civil Rights movements.  I found this book extremely interesting all around.  From the style of writing, to the format of chapters, collage picture art, and of course the detailed memories of a little boy.  Though Leon went to school and was somewhat educated, there was an obvious lack of English grammar and language.  This fact holds the authenticity of the author because it is his own words exactly, however I am not sure this book would be good for younger children in this sense because they are still learning how to speak and write proper English and this would not be a good example.  On the other hand, I also feel that this story did need to be recorded and does need to be told to people all around the world, as Susan L. Roth, the illustrator and original push for this book, thought.  Many of Leon's stories are hard to hear and in this day almost unimaginable, but that is the purpose of the tale, to inform everyone about things that did really happen and take place. 

     Some of the stories that stuck most with me were about the death of his father, the sharecrop farm owner, the children's school, and the stories about marching with Martin Luther King, Jr.  Also, throughout the book, Leon talked about tradition, and how the older generations did not question one thing about their lives.  How his parents and grandparents used their faith to accept and take whatever they were given in life and that they found it stupid that Leon would want to try to fight the way things were.  Learning about slavery and these times through school, I always kind of thought that everyone in this situation was mad and angry and fed up with the way they were always treated.  This story showed me that this wasn't the case, that some had accepted this life and especially know that their parents or grandparents had been actually slaves, meant that they had it good compared to them.  I found this very interesting while reading this story. 
     The last aspect of this book that I liked and was unique to this story, was how the stories were organized.  Leon told things in kind of a chronological order but that is not how it was organized.  Each chapter was a different category, one about the farm he lived on, one about school, one about the Klansmen, one about the jobs he worked, and so on.  I thought this was a great way to explain a lot of different parts of his childhood, getting the basics in with little stories along the way before the bigger stories come out.  Overall, I am very glad that I was able to read this book, and I think everyone should, though I might not use it in the classroom with younger students still learning correct English.  It might be better suited for a middle school level, where students can recognize that the language is different and still get the full benefit of the story.

Thank You, Mr. Falker

Title: Thank You, Mr. Falker
Author: Patricia Polacco
Genre Study: Contemporary Realistic Fiction grade level 2-4

I'm sure I have either read or have been read this story aloud sometime before even if I do not remember.  It is a great story that would be greatly important to read aloud to a classroom.  Though it is a short and easy picture book, the message is huge.  I also believe that more than one lesson or message can be found within this short text.  The main character, Trisha, is a brave and adventurous young girl excited about her grandparents tale of knowledge and reading.  She then learns how to accept events of death in her life.  The main and most important message is about the pace of learning.  I think this would be a great book to read aloud to a classroom in the beginning of the year.  With this lesson I would express the importance of acceptance of peers and the understanding that every individual learns differently and at a different pace.  This book is a great example because if is partially a true story of the author's own experience.  She had a lot of difficulty in school when she was a kid, and now she is an award winning author.  In my classroom this understanding and value of acceptance will be very important to me.  This is a great story to go along with the lesson, and the illustrations are also beautiful.  They go along with the story, and help the reader to picture the struggles of this young girl.  I loved this book and would recommend it to all.

Al Capone Does My Shirts

Title: Al Capone Does My Shirts
Author: Gennifer Choldenko
From the Newbery Honor List

In my opinion, I would say that this would be a great book to get boys interested in reading in the classroom.  I remember when I was in elementary school all of the boys were fussing over Al Capone and they loved this book.  Reading it now, it is not one of my favorites, but I would still recommend it to young boys who might be interested in some historical fiction involving the big mob boss.  I thought the build up was slow and I did not find the story too exciting until almost three-forths of the way into it.  At that point I could not put the book down.  The story is about a boy and his family that move to the Alcatraz Island in San Francisco in the 1930's.  The boy's sister unfortunately has some mental disablities and at this point in history, this type of thing is not very well accepted.  His mother will do anything with the smallest possibility to make her daughter normal and keep her out of an asylum.  The main character loves his sister and is the best with her, but he also wants a normal life outside of the house.  I still wish the big mystery issue at the climax was explained more after.  I wonder about what happened to the young convict as well as Natalie, the sister.  I really did enjoy the second half of the book, even though the beginning was slow.

Ella Sarah Gets Dressed

Title: Ella Sarah Gets Dressed
Author: Margaret Chodos-Irvine
From the Caldecott Award List

This book teaches the lesson that it is okay to be original and that you don't always have to be like someone else.  It is a very short and simple picture book targeted at young children but the illustrations are colorful and unique.  In particular, I noticed something interesting about the characters displayed.  Ella Sarah is present on every page and often with a full body view, however, her mother, father and sister are shown one at a time, body without a face or head.  This enforces that the story is about Ella Sarah and that the adults corrective comments are not as important as Ella Sarah's originality and her accepting friends.  The words used are also simple so that most children will not have a problem understanding any word being read to them.  Also, I love how repetition is used throughout the book which will help small children remember the words and get excited about the story.  Ella Sarah is a silly girl with a unique style unlike her family members, but in the end that is okay because her friends accept her for who she is.  This is a great lesson for kids to encourage creativity and originality as well as acceptance.

The Road to Paris

Title: The Road to Paris
Author: Nikki Grimes
From the Coretta Scott King Book Award List

     I loved this book.  The story was able to really pull at my emotions and I really felt like I got to know the main character, Paris.  Growing up in New York, she and her brother watched their mother struggle and were eventually turned to foster care.  Although the two tried to stay together, this story was about the family she lived with once they were separated.  Paris had to learn to be independent and strong without her big brother there to help her, and she was lucky to have the Lincoln family there to support her.  For some reason I have always been interested in adoption and foster care stories.  My younger brother is adopted and though his story is nothing like Paris', I feel that learning about his story has given me a great interest in all stories involving these issues.  

     The author uses some great descriptions and allowed me to picture every scene in my head.  She formed an emotional bond between the reader and the characters so that I felt every emotion Paris went through.  Paris takes a while to adjust to her new home, her new brothers, mother, and friend at school.  She takes their advice and eventually lets them in until she is hurt by a racial comment.  As she fights through this challenge, and the challenges her birth mother continues to give her with waves of love and hate, she is able to grow and love those who care for her.  Some parts were extremely sad, and the end was left almost open-ended, a big decision made without the consequences being revealed.  As a reader I want to know more of the story, I want to help children like Paris, and I want to share her brave journey.  This was an excellent book and I would recommend it to adults and older children.

Extra Credit

Title: Extra Credit

Author: Andrew Clements

From the Rebecca Caudill Award 2012 Master List