This month I explore a few older books and some newer ones, all featuring characters who take a look at where they are and how to break away to freedom when they need to.
And, because I acknowledge the rest of the country doesn't start the new school year August 1 the way my state does, I'll also be re-posting my teaching offerings in separate posts every Friday for teachers who are preparing lessons for the new school year.
Barakah Beats deals with a Muslim girl's dilemma about singing in an all-boy band for a school fundraiser. Waiting for Unicorns is a girl's struggle with grief and the underwater mammal equivalent of a unicorn, narwhals.
Joplin, Wishing explores a what if scenario: What if a girl trapped in a painting stepped out of it? And Meranda and the Legend of the Lake does the same: Are mermaids real, and what would that look like in a mermaid trapped on land from an early age? Words on Fire is a powerful historical fiction story about the Russians attempting to wipe the Lithuanian language off the map and the struggle to protect it. Freedom Swimmer, likewise, is a historical fiction based in real events of the author's family, and involves swimming from mainland China to freedom. Look Both Ways by Jason Reynolds is a series of short stories from multiple POVs of children living in the same neighborhood and going to school at the same middle school. It has excellent teaching resources, as well.
Get a Grip, Vivy Cohen! features an autistic girl's struggle to become a knuckleball pitcher on a (primarily) boys' Little League team. In non-fiction, three men encounter a hellacious storm in the Atlantic Ocean in A Storm Too Soon and I can't say a word more or I'll give away the end of this real-life tale of survival on the high seas. Gail Jarrow's Ambushed! The Assassination Plot Against President Garfield tackles a little-known US history event that horrifically highlights just how blessed we all should feel living in the modern era of medical science. Serious yuck factor reading this, but kids will love it for it!
For Teachers this month I offer Reading Roles Pages for an in-class readers theater of William Shakespeare's Tragical History of Frankenstein, Mary Shelley's classic sci-fi/horror in iambic pentameter and a five-act play. This is a 130-page gem by the modern Bard himself, Ian Doescher. Enjoy!
Looking for additional reads? Here are my Back-to-School reads from last year (2021):
