Tag Archives: elementary

Jun 10 2014

Goddess Girls: Athena the Brain by Joan Holub & Suzanne Williams

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Athena the Brain is the first book in the Goddess Girls series.  At the time of this writing, there are 13 books in the series.

The idea of these books is to present Greek mythology with a twist…the Greek gods and goddesses are tweens at Mount Olympus Academy (MOA)-a middle school for the privileged immortals (and a few non-human beings, monsters and other mortal characters from mythology.)  Clearly, this is set up as a serial, patterned book series-not unlike the good old days of Sweet Valley High and any myriad vampire series available nowadays.

The big difference that I can see is there are references to actual mythology that make the story more engaging.  Instead of vampire lore that can vary depending on where the story originates, these stories are based on extremely well-known myths.  There isn’t much variation in The Odyssey, for example, so anyone that has heard the story may snicker in that moment where Athena’s toy wooden horse falls out of her bag in Hero-ology class. (In fact, I think that some of my students would find the references pretty entertaining!)  The reader that knows mythology will get the jokes.  BUT, I don’t feel that anything is lost by not knowing the myths.

This particular story is cute and the characters are drawn in such a way that elementary age readers will identify with them.  They can easily see the personality types represented and the school-age dynamics are relatable.  MOA has all your typical students-the popular beauty, the jock, the outcast, the gossip, the brain, etc…they just happen to be Greek gods and goddesses.  Their encounters and conflicts with one another make reference to mythology and to the conflicts kids today are familiar with in a school setting.

This first book was a very easy read.  I plan to grab a few more over the next couple of months and see if their appeal holds when different characters are central to the plot.  It would be a breeze for a solid elementary-age reader, but would also appeal to middle school aged girls that may find reading to be a chore or a challenge.

 

May 30 2014

Flora and Ulysses by Kate diCamillo

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Oh, I wanted to love this book.  I really, really did.  I really enjoyed the majority of diCamillo books I’ve read, so when I saw a friend’s son reading this one, I asked to borrow it.  (He’s in second grade and quite a reader, but I waited to ask his opinion until after I had finished reading it.)  Turns out, the second grader and I had the same response to the story! To be perfectly honest with you, I had completely forgotten that I read this book until I saw it in a bookstore the other day…and I just read it last month.

Overall, it was okay.  “Meh” is my preferred statement here.  The story starts out fanciful enough…the squirrel, Ulysses, is sucked into a vacuum cleaner and then rescued by Flora.  Flora is obsessed with comic books, which annoys her romance-novel writing mother.  Flora’s parents are divorced and it is a strained relationship, so her escape into comic books is understandable.  Her father shares her love of comic books, although he seems to have some major issues dealing with the difficulties in his life, too, so it makes sense that he shares Flora’s escapism.

Ulysses develops all sorts of super powers after his vacuum incident-He can fly! He can type! He can understand human speech! He’s a poet!  But, by the end of the book, I still wasn’t really sure what the point of the whole relationship was for Flora.  Perhaps it was more escapism??  There are other periphery characters, but I honestly can’t remember their names or much about them.  When I asked my second grade friend what he thought, his response was pretty much the same: “It was okay.  I think the book was supposed to be funny, but I didn’t really like it.”  (Now, to be clear, this kid READS, and we’ve chatted about books before, so I’m fairly confident in his opinion.)

If you have a comic book obsessed child, this may be right up his/her alley.  Know that the mother says some rather unkind things to her daughter on more than one occasion, although in the end it is more or less resolved.  If you want a richer, more interesting diCamillo book, I would steer towards something like Because of Winn Dixie or Tale of Despereaux, instead.

May 26 2014

Igraine the Brave by Cornelia Funke

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Igraine is a 12-year-old girl that wants to be a knight. Unfortunately for her, she’s a girl and the only non-magician in her family.  Fortunately for her, her magician parents seem to be very tolerant of her dreams.  Her older brother, Albert, is less tolerant-but in a older/younger sibling annoyance sort of way.

Igraine’s parents are the most famous magicians in the kingdom and the owners of several magical singing books.  Over the centuries, many have tried to steal the books from Igraine’s ancestors and this is the key plot point of Igraine’s story, as well.  Of course, Igraine must come to the rescue when her parents accidentally turn themselves into pigs and her aspirations of becoming a knight become partially realized.

The story is fanciful-even silly at times-but I think it is a very enjoyable read for mid- to upper-elementary students.  The cast of characters are fun and light-hearted and much less menacing from some of Cornelia Funke’s other bad guy characters.  The ending is a bit abrupt, but easily workable in a classroom.  I intend to read this novel with my third grade gifted education students next year, as I think the story is accessible to them and there are a million projects and tasks that we could explore and create related to this story and connecting it to fairy tales and the medieval world of knights and kingdoms.

Jan 3 2014

The Land of Stories: The Wishing Spell by Chris Colfer

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The Land of Stories: The Wishing Spell is the first in a planned series by GLEE actor, Chris Colfer.  This book is the first novel he wrote/published.  The idea behind the novel is cute and it has great potential for growth and expansion.  I do hope that as his experience with writing increases, Colfer’s style develops in complexity.  As I was reading, I felt that he had all these ideas to get on paper, so the development of plot points suffered a bit.  In all honesty, this first book could have been divided into multiple volumes to give him time to develop each plot point and work on his descriptive writing skills.

All that being said, this is a relatively engaging read that I think many skilled elementary school age readers will enjoy.  The main characters are brother and sister twins that inadvertently find themselves trapped in the Land of Stories where all of our fairy tales originated.  They encounter all of the heroes and villains of our story history and find out new details and back stories to tie seemingly unrelated characters together.

The novel ends with a wide opening for a follow up-or two-or three.  I think that as his writing skills grow (and his attachment to a thesaurus develops) the stories that Colfe spins could become truly delightful.  This novel would be a great starting point for those kids that enjoy reading, but are intimidated by larger works.  The book itself is longer than those of Narnia and the like, but I think the writing style would be easier to access for kids that aren’t quite ready to read Narnia-level work on their own yet.  The Land of Stories: The Wishing Spell would be a fun and easy read-aloud with kids-both at home or for an elementary school classroom.

Jul 8 2013

The One and Only Ivan by Katherine Applegate

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The One and Only Ivan by Katherine Applegate is a fictionalized telling of the story of Ivan, the “shopping mall gorilla” of the 1970’s and 80’s.  Applegate, author of the Animorphs series, breaks away from serial YA fiction to bring us a first-gorilla account of Ivan’s time in his shopping mall home and his eventual move to a zoo.

Ivan is a witty and delightful main character.  I admit that I finished this book on a Wednesday morning and began reading it aloud to my fourth graders that same day.  My students enjoyed the gorilla-esque prose as I read, and I was careful to pause and emphasize the shortened, stylized sentences.  For skilled readers, the format of the words on the page will be very appealing.  (Another teacher in my school downloaded her copy and projected it on her smart board so that her students could see how the format enhanced the character’s voice.)

In the book, Ivan’s story starts with him as an adult, living in the mall menagerie.  There are flashback to his childhood in the jungle and his life with various trainers.  The story follows his mundane life in the mall into his introduction into zoo life.  The ending is open-we know he makes it to a zoo and begins to live life with other gorillas, but we don’t know much beyond that.  My students and I did research on the real Ivan to see what happened in his real story and how his zoo life experience was for him after leaving the mall.  It was a wonderful follow up after finishing the book.  (Ivan passed away at the Atlanta Zoo in 2012, after being a beloved part of the Atlanta Zoo family since 1994.)

There are characters in the book that were not part of the real Ivan’s experience.  They help give him a voice and create a context for his story-especially for younger readers.  There are references to poaching of gorillas and the how their hands have been sold as ashtrays on the black market.  There was also an explanation of the elephant training methods used by some less-humane circuses, including an incident with the baby elephant, Ruby.  Additionally, Ivan’s older elephant friend eventually dies due to old injuries sustained in her circus days.  HOWEVER, these are not reasons to avoid this book!  With the right explanation and openness to discussion, they are wonderful learning moments for kids.  One of my students even made reference to Charlotte’s Web and The Jungle Book when we were talking about these moments in class.  Kids that have been exposed to most children’s literature have the context for these moments…as adults, we sometimes forget that.

I highly recommend The One and Only Ivan for mid- to upper-elementary grades.  It is a wonderful independent read and a fantastic book to read along with your child and discuss.  A quick internet search will produce all kinds of information on the real Ivan for follow up discussions with your kids.

 

Click here to purchase the book through Amazon (including Kindle)