Thank you to the four or five people who emailed me in the past two days.
I have compiled my list for the parent who's running it, but I thought I'd share
some of 'em here just in case there are others who are doing the same thing.
Enjoy,
Josh Mika
LRC Director
Beebe Elementary
Naperville, IL
jmika@naperville203.org
________________________________________
THEY'VE USED:
A to Z Mysteries
Stink
Mouse & the Motorcycle
Cam Jansen
Magic Treehouse series
Flat Stanley
Tornado!
Chocolate Touch
Frindle
MY SUGGESTIONS:
Ivy & Bean
Clementine
Encyclopedia Brown
Sideways Stories from Wayside School
Shredderman series
Jigsaw Jones series
Charlie Bone (might be too long?)
OTHERS SUGGESTIONS:
Meet Addy
Mummies in the Morning (Magic Tree House)
Box Car Children (Book 1)
The Whipping Boy
The Flim Flam Man
The Stories Julian Tells
The Mercy Watson Series
Abby Takes a Stand
Dear Whiskers / Nagda
All About Sam / Lowry
SOS Files / Byars
Kid in the Red Jacket / Parks
Klondike Kid / Hopkins
Love that Dog / Creech
Gooney Bird Greene by Lois Lowry (This is a fav with my 2nd and 3rd grade teachers)
From Publishers Weekly Two-time Newbery Medalist Lowry (The Giver; Number the
Stars) introduces a feisty, friendly heroine in this light novel. Readers know
immediately that red-haired, freckle-face Gooney Bird Greene is as unorthodox as
her name: wearing pajamas and cowboy boots, she arrives at the door of her new
second-grade classroom all alone, "without even a mother to introduce her." She
announces she has just moved from China (which turns out to be the name of a town,
not the country) and demands "a desk right smack in the middle of the room, because
I like to be right smack in the middle of everything." Dressed each day in another
eccentric outfit, she relays to the class a series of stories that are "absolutely
true" even though they initially seem anything but. Stretching the facts creatively
through some wily wordplay, Gooney Bird explains how she spent time in jail (while
playing Monopoly), acquired diamond earrings at a palace (they came from a gumball
machine in an ice cream shop called The Palace) and directed a symphony orchestra
(she directed the lost driver of the bus transporting musicians to the auditorium).
Interruptions from curious classmates heighten the fun. Never mind the dubious
likelihood that a second-grader would possess such command of language and pithy
delivery; youngsters will likely hope that Gooney Bird has enough tales stored in
her fertile imagination to fill another volume. Final artwork not seen by PW. Ages
6-10.
Spiderwick Chronicles (they could read 1 or all 5)
Snarf Attack by Amato (lots of Captain Underpants appeal, with a real story)
Seal Island School 80 pages
From School Library Journal
Grade 2-4-Nine-year-old Pru is one of only 6 students in a school on Seal Island,
population 49, off the coast of Maine. She loves her home and, fearing that her
teacher Miss Sparling may move at the end of the year, hopes to convince her what a
wonderful place it is. To complicate the situation further, two students will soon
be leaving the island and the school will close if the enrollment falls below five.
Pru and a classmate then hatch a plan to buy their teacher a dog, reasoning that it
will prevent her from becoming lonely and keep her there. Subplots include Pru's
befriending Clara, a girl on the mainland, and a surprise birthday gift of a pony.
By school year's end, all of Pru's problems and worries are resolved. The
watercolor-and-line cover illustration depicts three children laden with books and
offers a glimpse of the blue sky and water that feature so prominently in the
story. The simple vocabulary, large print, varied sentence length, and upbeat
ending make this a good choice for beginning chapter-book readers.
Christina Dorr, Whitehall City Schools, OH
My Father's Dragon
My Father's Dragon--a favorite of young readers since the 1940s and a Newbery honor
book--captures the nonsensical logic of childhood in an amusingly deadpan fashion.
The story begins when Elmer Elevator (the narrator's father as a boy) runs away
with an old alley cat to rescue a flying baby dragon being exploited on a faraway
island. With the help of two dozen pink lollipops, rubber bands, chewing gum, and a
fine-toothed comb, Elmer disarms the fiercest of beasts on Wild Island. The quirky,
comical adventure ends with a heroic denouement: the freeing of the dragon.
Abundant black-and-white lithographs by Ruth Chrisman Gannett (the author's
stepmother) add an evocative, lighthearted mood to an already enchanting story.
Author Ruth Stiles Gannett 's stand-alone sequel, Elmer and the Dragon, and her
third volume, The Dragons of Blueland both received starred reviews in School
Library Journal and are as fresh and original as her first. (Ages 4 to 8) --This
text refers to the Paperback edition.
Book Description
When Elmer Elevator hears about the plight of an overworked and underappreciated
baby flying dragon, he stows away on a ship and travels to Wild Island to rescue
the dragon.
Card catalog description
A young boy determines to rescue a poor baby dragon who is being used by a group of
lazy wild animals to ferry them across the river on Wild Island.
The Year of Miss Agnes
From School Library Journal
Grade 2-5-Teaching the children in an Athabascan village in a one-room schoolhouse
on the Alaskan frontier in 1948 is not every educator's dream. Then one day, tall,
skinny Agnes Sutterfield arrives and life is never the same for the community.
Frederika (Fred), the 10-year-old narrator, discovers that unlike previous
teachers, Miss Agnes doesn't mind the smell of fish that the children bring for
lunch each day. She also stokes the fire to warm the schoolhouse before the
students' arrival each morning, wears pants, and speaks with a strange accent. Miss
Agnes immediately packs away the old textbooks, hangs up the children's brightly
colored artwork, plays opera music, and reads them Robin Hood and Greek myths. She
teaches them about their land and their culture, tutors both students and parents
in her cabin in the evening, and even learns sign language along with her students
so that Fred's deaf sister can attend school. Hill has created more than just an
appealing cast of characters; she introduces readers to a whole community and makes
a long-ago and faraway place seem real and very much alive. This is an
inspirational story about Alaska, the old and new ways, a very special teacher, and
the influence that she has over everyone she meets. A wonderful read-aloud to start
off the school year.
Kit Vaughan, Midlothian Middle School, VA
Dragon of Lonely Island by Rupp
Grade 3-6-Because their mother needs a quiet place to finish her novel, the three
Davis children find themselves spending the summer in a Victorian house on a small
island off the coast of Maine. A mysterious letter from their elderly Great Aunt
Mehitabel, absentee owner of Lonely Island, helps the siblings discover Fafnyr
Goldenwings, a three-headed dragon that sleeps deep inside a cave on Drake's Hill.
It can be prickly and fussy, but takes pains not to frighten the children, assuring
them at once that it is a vegetarian. Over the course of the summer, each head
awakes in turn and tells a story about children that the dragon had helped. It
drove away invading Mongols from a Chinese girl's village, saved an orphaned boy
from the clutches of evil pirates, and rescued a brother and sister marooned on a
desert island-but only after the siblings learned to think for themselves. The
children learn that the sister in the last story was actually a young Aunt
Mehitabel, who offered the dragon a sanctuary on Lonely Island. The Chinese story
has the tone of European tales of exotic Cathay and the other two are reminiscent
of earlier children's books, when adventures were more jolly than harrowing. This
smoothly written confection may be a tad bland and predictable, but it goes down as
easily as an entertaining, light read.
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