kids recommend The Miniature World of Marvin and James by Elise Broach

The Miniature World of Marvin and James begins a new companion series by Elise Broach, The Masterpiece Adventures.  In this beginning reader story, Marvin the beetle says goodbye to his best friend James, who is going on a weeklong vacation to the beach.  While he is gone, Marvin's plays with his annoying, but fun cousin, Elaine, and she leads him on an unusual adventure that distracts Marvin from missing his friend.  The amusing dialogue and engaging illustrations are sure to entertain young readers as they experience a big world through miniature eyes.

For this story, we thought we would let the kids do the talking.  These are some reviews from their perspective.

L. (age 7) wrote:

My favorite character is Elaine because she likes to go on adventures.  She keeps Marvin company while James is out of town at the beach.  I think it's fun when Elaine and Marvin go into the pencil sharpener.  They almost couldn't get out, but luckily Marvin came up with a plan and they were able to escape.

I also think it is funny that Marvin has his very own miniature art studio under the sink.  He even drew a picture of the beach for James!

K. (age 7) wrote:

Elaine is great character because she wants to go on a fun adventure!  She's excited and happy.  She's playful and does somersaults, dives, and even a belly flop.  She is just so cheerful!

I like the part of the story when Elaine and Marvin go into the pencil sharpener because there are soft wood shavings that they jump in a lot.  They dive in them over and over again.

The Miniature World of Marvin and James

by Elise Broach

illustrated by Kelly Murphy

published by Henry Holt and Co.

February 2014

recommended for ages 5-9

danyelle recommends Rainy Day Book of Things to Make and Do

We are 11 days into our summer vacation, and while my kids enjoy being outside, they have already had plenty of inside hours to fill.  I found Rainy Day Book of Things to Make and Do while browsing through kids' craft books in March, and I knew it would be perfect for summer days (rainy or not).

The book is organized into 8 sections ("Fun and Games," "Top Toys," "Rad Room," "Great Gifts," "Dazzling Decorations," "Cool Cards and Papercrafts," "Funky Fashions," and "Awesome Accessories") and includes a variety of projects (twig letters, pebble pets, paper plate animals, and pop-up cards)  Step-by-step instructions are clearly written, easy to follow, and include plenty of pictures.  Whether you are gluing, stitching, or painting, most of the projects require easy-to-find supplies, many of which we already had on hand.  Templates are included, making it easy for those of us who need to trace.  Although the title says the projects are "for kids aged 3-10," younger children will need significant help from adults.  The projects were just right for my seven- to ten-year-old children to complete with little assistance.

Here are a few of our projects.

Checker boards for our road trip in June.

Bandanna-covered journals that we are going to use for our summer poem books.

Stain glass butterflies decorate our back door.

We have more projects that we want to try this summer (notice the flags stuck in our book).  I just hope summer lasts a long time.

The Rainy Day Book of Things To Make and Do: More than 50 Creative Crafting Projects for Kids Aged 3-10
by Catherine Woram and Claire Youngs
published by Ryland Peters & Small
August 2012
recommended for ages 6 and up

diane recommends Graduation Day by Joelle Charbonneau

Although Diane wanted to review Independent Study last year, she never got around to it. Since the final book in the trilogy The Testing comes out on June 17, she is coming back with a guest post to talk about the trilogy.

Graduation Day by Joelle Charbonneau is the third (and final) book in The Testing Series. Malencia Vale (more commonly known as Cia) and her boyfriend, Thomas, along with many other friends, have been studying at the University. As friends have disappeared, Cia has discovered the terrible things her government does to the people who fail to meet standards at this challenging school. As she gets her schedule (more packed with challenging classes than anyone else’s) and struggles to keep reacting in a “normal” way with this work load, she finds time to start a rebellion, and figure out what is really going on. With a little risk, a little rebellion, some romance, and a lot of stubbornness, Cia manages to finish what she put her mind to without dying.

With a happy, but unexpected, and puzzling end, it perfectly sums up the two books preceding it with seamless perfection. Although not foreseen, the end is perfectly clear, yet keeps the reader wondering what Malencia will do next, and what she should do next.

This book is not like any other dystopian novel written: the usual predictability, the typical romance, and the horror of the fight. This book moves along quickly—so quickly that the reader barely has time to keep up, but then slows down in the perfect places to make the drama, the violence, and the romantic imperfections seem real.

This fast paced book is sure to please any reader wanting an action-packed romance. Right from the first page, the reader is thrown into this dangerous, but pleasing, setting. So, with perfect timing, and a lot of realistic mistakes, Graduation Day is the most realistic (and best) conclusion to a dystopian trilogy I have read.

Copy received from publisher for review.

Graduation Day

by Joelle Charbonneau

published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt

June 2014

Looking Forward . . . and Back

Today is the first day of summer vacation, and I am looking forward to tomato and basil sandwiches, star gazing, and time with my kids.  I am also looking forward to The Fourteenth Goldfish by Jennifer Holm, The Family Romanov by Candace Fleming, and the final book in Leigh Bardugo's Grisha trilogy, Ruin and Rising.

• If  you plan to be anywhere near Provo, Utah in July, you should attend BYU's excellent Symposium on Books for Young Readers.  Nathan Hale, Katherine Marsh, Paul Janeczko, Steven Kellogg, Maggie Steifvater, and Sy Montgomery are all on the schedule this year.  I am especially looking forward to hearing Sy Montgomery talk about one of my favorite new books this year, Chasing Cheetahs.

• Although it is a little early to be thinking about fall, you can put Utah Valley University's Forum on Engaged Reading on your calendar now.  October should be lovely in Deer Valley, and  Laura Vaccaro Seeger and Steven Sheinkin will be among the featured speakers.

• And that brings us in a round about way to . . . The 2014 Boston Globe-Horn Book Awards for Excellence in Children's Literature.  The judges selected Mr. Tiger Goes Wild by Peter Brown as their Picture Book Award winner.  The Port Chicago 50: Disaster, Mutiny, and the Fight for Civil Rights by Steve Sheinkin (you see the connection now, right?) was selected as the Nonfiction Book Award winner, and Grasshopper Jungle by Andrew Smith was chosen as the Fiction Book Award winner.  You can read more about the award and the winners here.

• And while we are talking about books from the past year, check out the 2013 favorites that Tara and I reviewed in the spring edition of The Utah Journal of Literacy.

May Storytime Briefly 2014

Yesterday was the last day of the school year.  While I am ready to have my kids home for summer break, I will miss the first graders and second graders who shared so many stories with me this year.

In May, we talked about siblings.  We read

• Maple by Lori Nichols
• "Brother" by Mary Ann Hoberman
• Flora's Very Windy Day by Jeanne Birdsall, illustrated by Matt Phelan

I love the illustrations in Maple--they remind me of summer afternoons, resting in the park and listening to my mom read Mary Poppins.  (I'm waiting for the red maple in my backyard to grow bigger so we can enjoy its shade.)  The first-graders were delighted to make the connection between the trees and the sisters' names.

A couple of days after I listened to the second graders read their own fractured fairy tales at the Second-Grade Book Bonanza, we talked about the gift of story.  We read

• Clever Jack Takes the Cake by Candace Fleming, illustrated by G. Brian Karas
• Hansel and Gretel illustrated by Sybille Schenker

The first graders went to the zoo, so we read books about zoos and zoo animals:

• Xander's Panda Party by Linda Sue Park, illustrated by Matt Phelan
• My Side of the Car by Kate Feiffer, illustrated by Jules Feiffer
• How to Hide a Lion by Helen Stephens

After we read My Side of the Car, the second graders told me about their first-grade bus breaking down on their way to the zoo the previous year.  (I got to hear the same story from the first graders who were relieved their bus had made to the zoo without mishap.)

We talked about hats (because I wanted an excuse to share these books.)  We read

• I Want My Back by Jon Klassen
• Caps for Sale by Esphyr Slobodkina
• Milo's Hat Trick by Jon Agee

We talked about names and read

• Chrysanthemum by Kevin Henkes
• My Name Is Elizabeth by Annika Dunklee, illustrated by Matthew Forsythe
• Nelly May Has Her Say by Cynthia DeFelice, illustrated by Henry Cole

When I took my kids to the library to meet Kevin Henkes, I realized that we hadn't read any of his mouse books for storytime this year.  It was time to fix that! 

And then for our final storytime of the school year, we read books about things to do during the summer:

• Roller Coaster by Marla Frazee
• At Night by Jonathan Bean
• Step Gently Out by Helen Frost, photographs by Rick Lieder
• Wolves by Emily Gravett

Okay, I admit that Wolves by Emily Gravett was a small stretch for a summertime activity but it sure was a fun way to end the year.

tara recommends The One Safe Place by Tania Unsworth

The One Safe Place is an unexpected and engaging dystopian novel set in a world where the rich rule and the poor stay out of their way.  More than the larger social commentary, however, this story explores the life of homeless orphans and a society that exploits them.  Slightly reminiscent of The Lord of the Flies or Among The Hidden, children take matters into their own hands when they discover the truth behind their isolated world.

Devin is a boy who lives on a secluded farm with his loving grandfather.  When his grandfather dies, however, he isn't able to maintain the farm by himself and sets off to a city he has never seen to find help.  Unfortunately, he  quickly realizes he has lived a very sheltered life and the security he has known is tenuous for a city orphan.  A kind act attracts the attention of an older boy, Roman, who invites Devin to live in a special home for children.  Devin and his new friend, Kit, eagerly trust Roman and travel to the Gabriel H. Penn Home for Childhood.

At first glance, the Home has everything a child could ever want or imagine.  But, after the initial sparkle has worn off, Devin realizes something is not quite right and nobody is allowed to leave.  While he and his new friends at the Home search for a way out, they also try to solve the mysteries surrounding the sinister Administrator and the "Visitors" that observe the children.

This gripping adventure is also somewhat creepy, but will keep you turning pages looking for the happy ending.  While geared to a YA audience, I would recommend The One Safe Place to anyone looking for a good read with a grim twist.

The One Safe Place
by Tania Unsworth
published by Algonquin Young Readers
April 2014
recommended for ages 12 and up

April 2014 Storytime Briefly

Since April is National Poetry Month, I took the opportunity to share a poem each week.  I have so many favorites that it was difficult to choose just a few, so perhaps I'll have to start sharing a poem a week in March next year.

We discussed similes and metaphors with the following poems and books:

• "Umbrellas" by Barbara Juster Esbensen
• Quick as a Cricket by Audrey Wood, illustrated by Don Wood
• Kitten's First Full Moon by Kevin Henkes
• "The Toaster" by William Jay Smith

I found a big red umbrella to pop open for "umbrellas bloom" in the poem, and when the red tulips in my flower beds bloomed a couple of weeks later, my daughters were quick to point out that the tulips were holding their "umbrellas upside down."

After discussing metaphors, I asked the children to guess the title of William Jay Smith's poem.  It took a couple of tries, but they guessed it.

We talked about color, and we read

• "Crayons" by Marchette Chute
• Blue Chicken by Deborah Freedman
• Bridget's Beret by Tom Lichtenheld
• The Noisy Paintbox by Barb Rosenstock, illustrated by Mary GrandPre

One of the first-graders refused to believe that Vasya Kandinsky could hear colors.  He just kept shaking his head and telling me that someone just made it up.  I suggested that he look it up when he got home, and he told me he would do just that.  He did enjoy looking at slides of Kandinsky's art, though.

We talked about the Beehive Book Award winners.  We read

• Twosomes by Marilyn Singer, illustrated by Lee Wildish
• The Princess and the Pig by Jonathan Emmett, illustrated by Poly Bernatene
• Mrs. Chicken and the Hungry Crocodile by Won-Ldy Paye and Margaret H. Lippert, illustrated by Julie Paschkis

Only the first two books were Beehive Book Award winners, but I've been looking for an excuse to read Mrs. Chicken and the Hungry Crocodile, and the switched at birth theme fit nicely with The Princess and the Pig.