RE 5140 Reading Log
Trish Edwards
Spring 2010
Title: Three Cups of Tea
Author: Greg Mortenson & David Oliver Relin
Adapted by Sarah Thomson Foreword by Jane Goodall
Publisher: Puffin Books, New York, 2009
Summary:
Greg Mortenson is an American who as a child grew up in Africa. His father set up the first teaching hospital in Tanzania. When he was eleven, he had climbed Mount Kilimanjaro with his father. His family returned to the U.S. when he started high school. When he was finished with high school, he decided to enlist in the U.S. army. After the army he went to college and graduated with degrees in chemistry and nursing. His father died from cancer before he graduated from college. His youngest sister, Chirsta, died from a seizure when he was thirty-four years old. He decided to honor his sister’s death by climbing the K2.
While trying to honor his sister, he got lost and found his way to a village in Pakistan called Korphe. The leader, Haji Ali, and children were very welcoming to Greg. Haji Ali invited Greg into his home giving him food and tea. While he was there he realized the children did not have a school. They were studying their multiplication tables in the frozen dirt with a stick and no teacher. Greg became very moved by the kindness from the people in the village and the children not having a school. He decided instead of climbing a mountain to honor his sister, he could build a school. Before he left the village of Korphe, he promised he would be back to build a school.
Greg overcomes a lot of hurdles in order to get the first school built. The first thing he needed to do was raise money. Once he gets the money, he was on his way back to Pakistan. But, he finds out getting a school built will take a lot longer than he thought. He also learns about the way of life there. In the village, they are more laid back than in the U.S. Once he finally gets the first school built, he is ready to find another village to help. His friend warns him to never travel alone and always wait for the village chief to invite you into his home and drink tea. Since Greg is a little impatient he does not follow all of the advice and ends up getting kidnapped. He learns an important lesson from this incident, which will help him build even more schools.
Personal Response:
This book really got me thinking about our country, the recession, Haiti and the impending tax increase. As seen in the book, the government does not take care of its citizens. It was one person from the outside who was able to get so much accomplished not through taxes but through charity. The same thing happened when the t.v. stations raised money for Haiti. There was a lot of money that was raised to help Haiti. A lot more can get done, if the government is left out and the money can be spent more wisely. Isn’t if amazing Greg was able to get a bridge built for ten thousand dollars and a school for twelve thousand dollars? If our taxes are raised too much, that will mean less money for charities. Charities are much more frugal with money than the government.
I liked when Haji Ali took the book from Greg and told him he could take care of running the school being built. I think as Americans we feel we have to go, go, go and we have to be producing something. We have very little family time. So, I think as Americans we can look at how this culture values family time and know how to relax. For me, I do not relax enough. My husband is always telling me I work too hard and I need to take time for myself.
Evaluative Comments:
This book has a great connection to what is going on right now in the Middle East. A lot of children do not understand where or what is going on with Afghanistan, Pakistan, India and Iraq. Through Greg’s story students can learn how there are good people there who have to live in very hard circumstances. Their government does not protect them. Students will also learn about Osama Bin Laden, radical Muslims and September 11, 2001. Students can learn that educating the people in these countries is crucial. In these countries, children and women are not treated as equals to men. From the book, it was told how celebrations would take place where the men would have plenty of food and the women and children would just have a little bit of rice to share. If they are educated, it will help keep the radical Muslim ideas out and help women to stand up for their rights. Students can see how important education is and how they should take their own education seriously. A connection can be made to politics in the United States. Children here need to understand their own government and what each party stands for. So, when it comes time for them to vote they can vote with intelligence.
This book contains a lot of problems and solutions. Greg decides he wants to build a school, so he has to figure out how to raise money. Then once he gets the money, he thinks it will be smooth sailing but it isn’t. He buys all of his supplies only to find that he can’t get them to Korphe. Then he finds Korphe needs a bridge first. Greg’s character can be discussed as to how he was able to solve each problem. He is a person who does not give up. He is willing to make a lot of self-sacrifices like being away from his family for long periods of time.
The pictures in the book really add to giving the reader a mental picture. For most children, they are probably not familiar with this culture. There are a lot of names and words that are unfamiliar also. The glossary helps with these. It can really get confusing with the names and when things happened since the story has flashbacks. The timeline at the end of the book helps with this. The map at the beginning of the book is wonderful too. Before reading this book, it would be a good idea to let the children look at all the pictures, map, glossary and timeline before beginning to read the book.
The interview at the end of the book with Greg’s daughter ,Amira, is a neat feature. Throughout the book, students read about her birth and her visit to Pakistan and how Greg misses his daughter. This allows students to see Amira’s point of view about what is going on in the Middle East and how she misses her father. From the interview, students can see how mature Amira is and how her father is a big influence in her life.
RE 5140 Reading Log
Trish Edwards
Spring 2010
Title: Rules
Author: Cynthia Lord
Publisher: Scholastic Inc, New York, 2006
Summary:
Catherine is a 12 year old girl, who has a younger brother, David, who is autistic. She has to babysit him a lot. So, she helps him cope by writing down rules in a notebook and tries to explain to him how the world works.
A new girl named Kristi moves in next door, just as she becomes friends with a boy named Jason from David’s occupational therapist office. Jason has a disability. He is in a wheelchair and is not able to talk on his own. He uses word cards to communicate to people. Kristi sees a drawing of Jason in Catherine’s notebook and assumes it is her boyfriend. Catherine wants to appear cool to Kristi, so she doesn’t give any details about Jason. Kristi tells Catherine she needs to invite Jason to the community center dance. Catherine has two problems. The first one is she doesn’t dance and the second one, is she doesn’t want to get embarrassed by bringing Jason to the dance. Then, Jason asks her to the dance and she doesn’t want to hurt his feelings.
Will Catherine go to the dance with Jason?
Personal Response:
This book reminds me of when I learned Morse code in order to obtain my amateur radio license. I was about Catherine’s age when I learned it. It is very hard and I don’t remember a thing, except they always use to say dit(short) dah (long) in class to help us learn the short and long dashes.
I’m also reminded of friends of mine, who have a daughter who had a complicated delivery and left her severely brain damaged. It is hard because the little girl is just one year younger than my daughter. She also has an older brother. The parents realize, he will have to help with her longer than they will. They feel guilty, because their whole life revolves around getting her to the right specialists and just dealing with feeding and changing her.
When Catherine talks about liking to go to Elliot’s Antiques, reminds me of my older son. He loves to go antique shopping with me, when we are visiting my family in Ohio. He also has bamboo in his room like Catherine.
He loves art just like Catherine.
Evaluative Comments:
This book is realistic fiction. Autism is a disability that does affect many people and families today. A lot of times people do not know how to treat people with disabilities. Through the point of view of Catherine, the reader gets a glimpse of what it is like to have a sibling with a disability. Catherine’s brother David has autism and she knows how to act around him. Even though she deals with her brother’s disability every day, she gets flustered about how to act around Jason. For example, on page 46 she talks about how she hates when people won’t look at David and act embarrassed by him. She felt guilty, because she had done the same thing to Jason.
There are connections made to other literature in this book for situations that Catherine is going through. For example one of David’s favorite books is Frog and Toad by Arnold Lobel. Catherine talks about how one of the stories Toad keeps finding buttons, but none of them are the right ones. She wants to use this story to expain to David that he is like Toad seeing all the cars but none of them are his dad’s car. But, she realizes it would take to long to explain. She makes another connection to Harry Potter. One time when her mother is reading about how Harry Potter had the cloak that made him invisible. She related it to her life. Jason’s mom, Mrs. Morehead, had just confronted Catherine about drawing Jason. It really had bothered the mom that she had drawn Jason, because she had not asked for permission. Catherine felt very embarrassed and wanted disappear under a cloak, just like Harry Potter.
The title of each chapter begins with one of Catherine’s rules for David. Then, during the chapter a situation occurs that deals with that particular rule. The chapter titled: If you can only choose one, pick carefully, has Catherine make a choice. She has to choose between going to Kristi’s house to watch t.v. or going to David’s clinic to see Jason. She had drawn more cards for Jason and was looking forward to seeing him again. She has some internal conflict here because she is torn between making a new friend and wanting to be cool to hanging out with Jason at the clinic, even though it isn’t the cool thing to do.
Catherine’s inner conflict continues throughout the book. When Kristi asks about Jason, Catherine tries to change the subject. She doesn’t want Kristi to think she isn’t cool. So, she doesn’t explain how she knows Jason. Deep inside, even though she doesn’t understand why, she enjoys spending time with Jason. Catherine has a tender heart.
RE 5140 Reading Log
Trish Edwards
Spring 2010
Title: The Tiger Rising
Author: Kate DiCamillo
Publisher: Candlewick Press, Massachusetts,2001
Summary:
This book is about a boy named Rob, who just lost his mother to cancer. He and his father move from Jacksonville to Lister, Florida. His father gets a job at the Kentucky Star motel and this is where he and Kenny live. Both Rob and his father have a lot of grief. Rob did a lot of crying at his mother’s funeral. After the funeral, Rob’s father told him there was no need to cry anymore. Rob tried very hard not to cry. He developed a rash, on his leg from trying to keep everything bottled up inside. The rash was so bad, that he got kicked out of school, because it was thought to be contagious. He would also imagine his feelings in a suitcase locked up tight. This tactic seemed to be working until he met a strong willed girl named Sistine. The more he hung out with her, the harder it was to not think about his mother.
Rob finds a tiger caged up in the woods behind the motel. He ends up showing the tiger to Sistine. As soon as she sees it, she wants to set it free. Then the owner of the motel, Beauchamp, gives Rob the keys to the cage to feed the tiger. He is supposed the keep this arrangement a secret. Of course, Rob can’t keep the secret from Sistine and he tells her about the keys. He also tells Willie May, the house keeper of the motel, about the tiger. Rob is unsure if they should set the tiger free at first. Then with the persistence of Sistine, they let the tiger out. Will Rob and Sistine be safe from the tiger?
Personal Response:
When Sistine was introduced in chapter three, it reminded me of The Watson’s Go to Birmingham when Rufus was introduced. They both were introduced by getting on the school bus wearing strange clothes. Kenny felt a little relieved because there was someone stranger than him. Kenny ends up being friends with Rufus just like Rob ends up being friends with Sistine. In The Tiger Rising Rob thought: “Nobody wore pink lacy dresses to school…Here was somebody even stranger than he was. He was sure.” Even though she was strange, he seemed to be drawn to her. She had even “shot him a look of pure hate.” But this did not stop him from trying to help her out when she was in a fight. He had enough courage to say “Leave her alone.”
This book makes a connection to the poem by William Blake Tiger! Tiger! Sistine told Rob about the poem and he thought: “He liked the fierce and beautiful way the words sounded. Just as he was getting ready to ask Sistine to say them again, she whirled around and faced him.” When I first read about the tiger in the cage, I thought of this poem too before DiCamillo made reference to it. It would be a good idea to have students become familiar with the poem and see if they make the connection. I have used this poem with my second graders and they loved the music of it, just like Rob. It seemed fitting when they had the funeral for the tiger, that Sistine again recited as much of the poem as she could remember.
Evaluative Comments:
Throughout this book a metaphor is used to describe how Rob keeps his feeling bottled up inside. “He made all his feelings go inside a suitcase; he stuffed them in tight and then sat on the suitcase and locked it shut”. Things that occur in his life help him to not think about the death of his mother, the rash and the boys who make fun of him. When Sistine was first introduced, he was able to think “about the tiger. He thought about God and Adam. And he thought about Sistine. He did not think about the rash. He did not think about his mother. And he did not think about Norton and Billy Threemonger. He kept the suitcase closed.” After spending more time with Sistine, it gets harder and harder to keep his suitcase closed. It first happened after they went into the woods and Sistine saw the tiger for the first time. He began to remember the last Christmas his mother was alive. That night “Rob remembered, and as he remembered… He shook his head and scolded himself for opening his suitcase.” He began to realize “words in his suitcase seemed to fall right out of him when he stood before Sistine.”
This book has a theme of freedom, anger, grief and friendship. For example the tiger is caged up and Sistine says: “This isn’t right, for this tiger to be in a cage. It’s not right.” Rob takes the stance of: “We can’t do nothing about it.” But, Sistine is a very strong and opinioned character and won’t except that. She says, “We could let him go… We could set him free.” While riding with Beauchamp, after seeing the tiger, Rob realizes: “who the tigers stare reminded him of. It was Sistine…He knew that she would insist that they now had to let the tiger go.” The caged up tiger is a metaphor for Rob’s grief and Sistine’s anger about her father. Sistine’s anger about her father not coming to get her happened when, “she shook the cage and beat her head against the chainlink” Later Rob comes to the realization that Sistine’s father is not coming to get her and he confronts her with this information. He says, “Your daddy ain’t coming for you…amazed at what he suddenly knew to be the truth.” When they finally let the tiger out of the cage, his suitcase was fling upon finding his father shot the tiger.“He opened his suitcase. And the words sprang out of it, coiled and explosive.” He could not longer keep the feelings and thoughts about his mother packed away. He could no longer hold back the tears. Through the whole book Rob starts to realize Sistine is his friend. At the beginning of the book he is confused about his feelings. “Rob felt his heart move inside him…it was an oddly familiar feeling, but he couldn’t remember what it was called.” At the end of the book, Rob realizes Sistine is his friend when they are holding hands. “He marveled at what a small hand it was and how much comfort there was in holding on to it.” They both have heartaches and will be able to help each other get through it.