kiddieliter

Allen Say, the author, reminisces on his granfather’s journey in America and Japan and tells how he himself grew up and adapted to both worlds.

Keisha learns about her historical family background of sweet grass basket weaving, and wants to continue the tradition. They find baskets that her great-grandfather made and one her grandmother made when she started basket weaving. Keisha brother wants to know if it is just for women because he really wants to basket weave as well.

“A Chair For My Mother”, is a picture book about a family who loses everything in a fireand have to make sacrifices to get back on their feet.  The family consist of a grandmother, mother, and a daugther.  Several neighbors helped out by replacing some of the things the family lost but something just wasn’t right.   They all decide to save all their money and put it in a jar.  When they had saved enough money, the family went out and bought a chair because comfortable one they had was damaged in the house fire.  With this chair the family felt as if all worries were gone away. 

Karen Hesse tells the story of Tessie, a little girl anxiously awaiting a storm on a hot summer day. As the storm approaches, she gathers her friends together in their bathing suits so that they can go out and enjoy the wonderful rain. This is a excellent story that portrays a positive image of friendship and mother-daughter relationships in an urban setting. The illustrations are beautiful and colorful and it’s a great read.

Faced with the difficulties of growing up and choosing a religion, Margaret talks over her problems with her own private God.

This book is about the past presidents, from George Bush to Bill Clinton, it tells their biography is a comical way. It offers facts, and comments said about each president while in office. They tell about all of the perks of being in office, having to do chores, and the downside of being president, scandals, etc.

Let Them Play is a book about a black little league baseball team who were unable to play in the little league world series due to the time they lived in.  This book takes place in segregated, SC in 1955.  It deals with the happenings of the civil rights also.  In this book the boys traveled to play in the world series but were unable to because there were no white teams that would play them.  I feel this book is a memoir of Jackie Robinson because he was teh first black to be in the league.  The illustrations are beautifully drawn in this book and it depicts exaclty how things happen during that time. 

Victoria Woodhull was the first woman to run for president, the first woman to have a seat on the stock exchange, the first woman to own a newspaper, and the first woman to speak before Congress. She was born in poverty, she was the seventh of ten children. Because her family was so poor, she began working at age eight as a child preacher. When she got older, she knew she wanted a better life. She married, divorced, moved to New York City, and became a millionaire by offering Cornelius Vanderbilt financial advice from the spirit world.  Through all of that, she still wanted more. She wanted to address and challenge society’s strict limitations on women. She announced herself as the first female president candidate for the presidency of the United States. She founded her newspaper to publicize her 1872 campaign. Even though she did not win, she made history and times for women would never be the same.

Amazing Grace is a book about a little girl named Grace. She is a very energetic girl who loves to act out stories when they are read to her. When she finds out that her class is performing the play “Peter Pan”, she wants to try out for the main character, Peter Pan. Her classmates disapprove of her because she is a girl and the part of Peter Pan is a boy, and also because she is black. Despite her classmates disapproval, Grace is reminded by her grandmother that she can do anything she puts her mind to. With that said, Grace tries out for the part, and wows her classmates and teacher. Because of her awesome performance, she gets the role of Peter Pan.