Kid Lit Review: The Secret Zoo

What would you do if you started to receive strange clues from Zoo animals about your sister's disappearance?  Think you were seeing things?  Investigate the Zoo?  Call on the other Action Scouts (friends) to help you figure it out?  That's what Noah does when his sister, Megan, disappears.  Noah, Ellie and Richie find themselves being noticed by the Zoo animals, as if the animals know who they are.  The animals seem to be helping the Action Scouts try to find Megan.

A secret world is opened up to the Scouts--where they befriend a polar bear named Blizzard, a penguin named Podgy, and a kingfisher named Marlo.  The Secret Zoo by Bryan Chick is both wondrous and dangerous with adventure and wild animals lurking at every turn.  It won't be an easy task for the Action Scouts to find Megan.

I enjoyed this story because I loved reading about the animals befriending and helping the children.  Who wouldn't want to go the Zoo and have one of the animals recognize you and come up to you?!  The author says when he was 9, he "wondered what it would be like if zoo exhibits had secret passages that allowed kids to get in and animals to get out."  There are also themes of conservation and stewardship of the animals in our world.

Read a preview of the book here.



Image from bryanchick.com

Escape From Mr. Lemoncello's Library Book Review

I am a re-reader of books I've fallen in love with.  I try to make it a yearly or every other year habit.  A few of the books I read each year are in this post.  I'm excited to announce that I found my next yearly read and it makes me feel like a nerdy school librarian.  It's Escape from Mr. Lemoncello's Library by Chris Grabenstein.  I want to live in Mr. Lemoncello's Library...and soon you'll find out why.

The main character is Kyle, a 12 year-old, who enjoys a variety of games.  He really admires local celebrity Mr. Lemoncello, the eccentric gamemaker.  Mr. Lemoncello has donated money for the local library to be rebuilt in what can only be described as a cross between a library, science center, and MIT.  Grabenstein's imagination for the concept of this library is brilliant--holographic librarian, rotating Dewey Decimal light displays on the ceiling, animatronic ducks in the children's area that will sing or quote children's books, an automated book sorter, and the list goes on.

Kyle and his friends, along with some of his other classmates find themselves in one huge game when they have won the opportunity to preview the library before the public.  They must escape out of the library, but not in the fashion they entered.  Game challenges range from pictographs to anagrams to room-sized board games. Readers will be able to play along with clues in the book.  In fact, you can find out LOTS more information from Grabenstein's website.



Image from chrisgrabenstein.com

Doll Bones Book Review

The debate was whether we get the title for a lit set or not.  The cover, though relevant to the story, makes one think the book is "girly" (even if the doll looks a bit creepy).  That sadly enough nixed the book--in which case, I had to read it because I wanted to know what it was about.  The actual plot of Doll Bones by Holly Black--three middle school friends embark on an adventure to find out the truth about the mysterious doll known as the "queen."  Zach, Poppy, and Alice turn the story from imaginary kid play to a full-on traveling adventure.

What helps balance the story is that its 3rd person perspective follows Zach, a middle school boy, struggling between playing a game using imaginative stories through "doll play" with his friends, Poppy and Alice or taking on a more stereotypical middle school boy persona and hanging out with his basketball teammates.  There's a moment of harsh reality when his deadbeat father trashes his dolls telling him it's for his own good.  I could feel Zach's anger radiate off the page...that's descriptive character writing.

The story progresses into an adventure because of Zach's secondary reaction to his dolls being destroyed, which is to tell Poppy and Alice he doesn't want to play the game anymore.  The next thing you know is that Alice and Poppy are standing underneath Zach's window telling him the ghost of the "queen" has spoken to Poppy and she wants them to bury her in her lost grave.  The journey the three friends find themselves on is wrought with mystery, suspense, and the challenge of facing adulthood.

Needless to say, I'm recommending it as a lit set. 


Image from blackholly.com.

Really Getting Into the Mystery Genre

Ha!  I love it!

There is a reading incentive program at my school that involves grades 4 and 5 students reading a certain amount of books in each genre.  To help students figure out distinguishing features of each genre, I'm taking individual class periods to teach one genre every other month.  The first genre I'm teaching is mystery.  I'm SO excited about teaching mysteries because I'm dressing up as a detective! 

Class started with student's background knowledge.  I let them come to the board and finish the prompt, "A mystery is..."  I get a kick out of how many of my students seem reluctant to go up and then all it takes is one and the whole class wants to write their opinion.

The heart of the lesson involves a re-purposed book care activity. The basic jist is I let the students know there has been a crime in the library and that books have been damaged (insert student gasp here).  They receive their own detective's notebooks to write down the information.  I introduce the vocabulary in their notebooks by modeling how to fill in the notebook.  Then I introduce the suspects.  I use cartoon villains--Shredder, Mr. Crabs, Pizza Steve, and Aloysius O'Hare.  Students LOVE seeing the suspects!!
  

Detective's Notebook (inside view)

We move on to the part where they need to fill out the sections: crime committed, suspects, evidence, clues, and who they believe actually committed the crime out of the four suspects.  They choose a book from the evidence pile and work with a partner or their table to look through the book and figure out what's wrong with the book.  Possible issues are: ripped pages or binding, writing, food stains, and water damage.  They use their inferring skills to connect the villain to the crime...Mr. Crabs lives under water, so he probably damaged a book with water or Pizza Steve is food so he most likely got food stains on books.

Student interest and excitement...check!
Using this lesson yearly now...oh yeah!