The original target was:
I am hoping to find a great book to use for a parent/child book club. I
would like to use historical fiction that is appropriate for 5th graders. I
would appreciate any suggestions.
Thank you to everyone who provided ideas. They were as follows:
*http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Running_Out_of_Time_(novel)
See the reference above to Margaret Peterson Haddix/s novel Running Out of
Time - This would be an excellent choice, I think.
*How about the following by Ann Rinaldi? Cast two shadows : the American
revolution in the South
Summary:
In South Carolina in 1780, fourteen-year-old Caroline sees the Revolutionary
War take a terrible toll among her family and friends and comes to
understand the true nature of war.
*I loved reading Watsons Go to Birmingham with my 5th graders. It's a novel
that parents AND kids would relate to and enjoy-- laughter and tears
*What about the Little House series? Caddie Woodlawn? Witch of Blackbird
Pond???
*One of my all-time favorites is "The Island on Bird Street" by Uri Orlev.
This won the Mildred Batchelder award for an original translation when it
first came out in English (translated from Hebrew). My 5th graders loved it
as a read-aloud. It's the story of a Jewish boy in WWII Poland who hides
out in a bombed out building while hoping to be reunited with his father who
was arrested in a ghetto raid. It is suspenseful and compelling--a real
page turner, I think. Just my 2 cents!
*Ann Rinaldi writes a great range of historical fiction, however I'm not
sure how much is on the level of 5th grade reading material. I do think
there are a few within that range and they cover a variety of topics from
integration in schools, the legend of Tempe Wick, Civil War, and so on.
*I have 2 titles to suggest...
The Watson's Go to Birmingham...1963 by Christopher Paul Curtis
Al Capone Does My Shirts by Gennifer Choldenko
They both have humor and lots of discussion points.
You might be able to track down an audio of Watsons. Levar Burton's reading
is hillarious!
*please use my historical fiction site
http://bookgirl3.tripod.com/historicalfiction.html
*How about an Ann Rinaldi or Carolyn Reeder book? They both have many
historical fiction options, and I can think of several that would be
appropriate for 5th graders. You'll have to pick what time period/setting
you want to focus on.
A few people asked about our plans. This will be our second parent/child
book club. We did one over the summer using The Kite Fighters. It was a
great success, so we're really looking forward to this one! For our first
one we met once a week, in the evening, at school. The Kite Fighters is
about 150 pages, so we only met four times. We encouraged parents to attend
(and most did), but we did not require it. We gave everyone a copy of the
book and a "study guide" before the first meeting. The study guide included
vocabulary, anticipation questions, discussion questions, etc. for that
week's reading.nothing too hard.just enough to make them think about what
they read. We gave them a new discussion guide at each meeting, as well as
some puzzles, stories, and/or short histories that related to the book. At
each meeting we opened with something historical.Korean history, kite
history, etc. We talked about what we'd read and went over the puzzles and
discussion guides. We closed with some sort of game. We had Korean treats
at each meeting. At the final meeting we played Kite Fighter Jeopardy and
flew kites. It was really cool to see the parent/kid interactions. It was
so much fun that we're going to do it again! Three of us worked together on
it (a fifth grade teacher, our gifted teacher and me).so we were able to
share the workload.
Thank you again to everyone who provided suggestions!
Mary Alice Hudson
Media Specialist
Cape Fear Elementary
Rocky Point, NC
mah@artichoke.org
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