Windows

Denos, J. (2017). Windows. Massachusetts: Candlewick Press.
32 Pages, Pre-K--2nd Grade, Picture Book

The book “Windows” by Julia Denos helps children to ponder and reflect about their community around them as the main character takes his dog for a walk around the community as the sun is setting. The illustrator E.B. Goodale does amazing work with helping to create imagery for the simple to read yet thought provoking story line. E.B. Goodale keeps the houses simples and dark which helps the inside of the windows and the sunset stand out as the main focus.

I originally picked the book because Julia Denos is one of my favorite children’s book illustrators! I was quite surprised but not at all disappointed when I found E.B. Goodale’s illustration to bring the very simple text to life. While the illustrations seem simple, if you look closely, there is so much to look at on every page. The size of the book is perfect for the beautiful sunsets on each page to be emphasized. On the front and back of the book behind the protective cover are absolutely beautiful simple paintings of the sky done by E.B. Goodale.

While the text for the book is simple, it creates more open options for the reader’s mind to wander. The book is very smooth to read from beginning to end. I would highly recommend this book on a shelf for children to read, or better yet, read just before bedtime from a parent to a child.

Becoming Bach

Leonard, T. (2017). Becoming Bach. New York: Roaring Book Press.
40 pages, K-3rd Grade, Biography, ISBN # 9781626722866

This beautifully illustrated picture book biography of Johann Sebastian who shares his dream of one day following his families musical footsteps and becoming a "bach," that is to say, a musician. The book is written by Tom Leonard but written as though in the words of Bach himself. Bach describes how music had the strongest influence in his life starting from when he was a small child. He came from a family of musicians who were able to teach him instruments such as the harpischord, violin, flute and organ. Bach's life was full of triumphs and struggles as he was orphaned as a young boy and was then raised by his older brother. His older brother was then the one to help Bach on his way to greatness as he gave him music lessons. Bach's story is beautifully told with colorful illustrations that help the reader understand how Bach saw the world not as everybody else does, but more in music, patterns and color.

I really enjoyed this book because of the beautiful illustrations that engaged and made the words on the page almost like music to my ears. While the words are fairly simple and to the point in the book, the artwork makes the pages come to life and gives so much understanding to Bach's life and how music influenced him. I love how they describe how Bach was able to express himself through his music in a way that he couldn't describe himself with anything else. His passion for music seemed to be as natural as anyone else breathes. I highly recommend this book to help students understand more about Bach and his life but also to help the students recognize their own passions in this life.

Reviewed by: Karlie E.

Caroline's Comets: A True Story

McCully, E. (2018). Caroline's comets: A true story. New York. Holiday House

Ages 4-8. Nonfiction. ISBN:9780823436644

Caroline's comets is the true story of how Caroline became the first women astronomer. Caroline became interested in the stars when she moved to England with her brother to become a singer. Caroline and her brother William became very interested in the stars and later built the most powerful telescope in their time. This was a starting point to Caroline becoming one of the first famous women astronomers.

When I first saw this book I thought it would be very boring but when I got through it I was actually very intrigued. I would definitely recommend this book to schools because of its sense of empowerment and its historical background. We get to see the history of early astronomy, and also what it was like in Europe in that time period. Because of these factors, I would recommend this book for schools.

Reviewed by Elaina Berry

Argyle Fox

Letourneau, M. (2017). Argyle Fox. Indianapolis: Tanglewood. 32 pages, Pre-K--2nd Grade, Picture Book, ISBN # 9781939100092.

This book is about a little fox who is struggling to find something fun to do on a windy day. He tries many different activities and meets many other animals, but that quickly gets ruined by the wind that either blows his fun and games away or destroys it. He then gives up and tells his mother that there is nothing to do on a windy day, but she encourages him to keep thinking and trying. He then comes up with the perfect thing to do on a windy day, he builds a kite and goes out to fly it in the wind.

I really enjoyed this book, it has a great story with good illustrations. This book is a good uplifting book for students. I think the underlying concept that is being taught throughout the book is to never give up and to always persevere. The fox never gave up when he kept trying different activities to do during the windy day. He continued to try different things until finally he found the perfect activity. It also teaches students to be creative and think for themselves.

Reviewed by: Jordyn R. 

Women in Sports: 50 Fearless Athletes Who Played to Win

Ignotofsky, R. (2017). Women in Sports: 50
Fearless Athletes Who Played to Win. Berkeley,
CA: Ten Speed Press.

128 pages, Grades 4 & up, Nonfiction/Biography, ISBN: 978-1607749783

This book goes through history to show women that have made a change by excelling in sports. It goes to prove that women are not the “weaker sex.” Women are strong and can do anything they put their mind to. The book is filled with stories from late 1800 until today of women that grew up to and achieved their dreams as athletes. We learn about women who broke away from the stereotypes about women in many sports from figure skating to weightlifter to rower and it goes on. There is also a timeline of women athletes in history as well as a chart of the muscle anatomy of a woman. There is even a statistics of the pay gap between men and women in sports.

This book is a great book to share with all of your kids both male and female. This book can help students stray away from the stereotype that women are weak and learn that both men and women can achieve anything they set their minds to. It is also a great way to show the achievements of women in sports throughout history. I highly recommend this book for all grades. It may be harder for some students to read but there are a few charts and diagram that the students can learn from. The best part of this book is that you do not have to read it from beginning to end. Kids can jump from one page to another and learn about different women in different sports.

Reviewed by Kristina Smith

Starring Carmen!

Denise, A., & Alvarez, L. (2017). Starring Carmen! New York: Abrams Books for Young Readers. 

32 pages. age range 4-8. ISBN: 978-1419723216

This book is about a young girl named Carmen who loves the spotlight. She puts on a show every night for her family that has extravagant dance and music numbers. In every production, Carmen always has to be the center of attention but when brother joins the show, She later needs to learn how to share the spotlight. 

The colors in this book really drew me to it. I loved the colors they used and their illustrations. This would be a great book for learning life lessons but I would not recommend this book for a social studies unit. I think the only reason this would be considered a social studies book is because they are of an ethnic background. It does not focus on history or anything pertaining to social studies. This version is also supposed to be in English but they write phrases in Spanish that are not common words that English speakers would understand. This is a cute story but because of its lack of social studies topic, I would not recommend this book.

Reviewed by: Elaina Berry

She Persisted

Clinton, C., & Boiger, A. (2017). She Persisted: 13 American Women Who Changed the World. New York, NY: Philomel Books. 

32 pages. 4-6 years. Nonfiction. ISBN: 978-1524741723

This book focuses on many women throughout history who were at an average or lower starting point and then persisted to achieve great things. This book shows women who become doctors, astronauts, and even social icons. This book focuses on famous American women but the author has written similar books that focus on women of the world. In this book, they share stories of women's success and then ends by empowering the reader to be like these great American women. 

When I saw this book I was instantly drawn to this book because of it’s empowerment to women. I would recommend this book for schools but it may only appeal to the female population. I feel that this book would be a good tool for teaching social studies because of how it identifies famous Americans in history. This book would be a good introduction to a unit on famous Americans in history. This book also has a sense of empowerment to women which I think is always good to learn in school. Because of these factors, I would recommend this book. 

Reviewed by: Elaina Berry

Ghost Ship

Owen, R. (2017). The Ghost Ship: The Pharaoh's Buried Vessel. New York New York: Bearport Publishing. 32 pages, Grades 4-6, Juvenile Nonfiction, ISBN 9781684020270.

This book is about an archaeologist named Kamal Al-Mallakh and his discovery. This archaeologist discovered the world’s oldest surviving ship in the Egyptian desert. The book then goes on and explains who the Ancient Egyptians are, how they lived back in 3000 B.C. to 300 A.D, and the impact that the Nile river had on them. The Nile river had a big impact on the people and fishermen, it was their source of food, water, and transportation by boat. The book then explains how ships were built, the importance of them and details about the ship that Kamal Al-Mallakh discovered.

This was a very informative book. I enjoyed reading it and learning new things about the Nile river, Ancient Egyptians and the ship that was discovered. The book has very detailed and colorful pictures to describe the text, which will draw students in to picking up this book and reading it. I think this book is aimed more towards older students because of the vocabulary and topics that it contains. One thing that I did not like as much about this book was how much information it contained within very few pages. It is a lot of information for a student to take in all at once, I think they will end up looking at the pictures and putting the book down. However, it can be used as a resource for teachers and a textbook in a sense.

Reviewed by: Jordyn R. 

Emma's Circus

Fleming, C. (2017). Emma's Circus. NewYork, NY: Farrar, Straus and Giroux.

40 pages, Grades 1-2,, Fiction, ISBN: 978-0374399078

Emma has never been to the circus before but when she begs her family to take her they sadly tell her no. The family has too much to do on their farm as winter approaches and cannot take a break. Then the next day something amazing happens. A bear on a unicycle shows up. The circus comes to Emma. Throughout her week more and more animals from the circus keep coming back to play with Emma. SHe tries to show her family but everyone is too busy with work to even notice the circus animals she sees. In the end, when all the work is done, her family comes to see what all the noise is. Emma finally gets to put on an amazing circus show for her family.

This book is a fun and creative story. It is a great book to share with kids to help them use their imagination. the illustrations are beautiful and they pull you into Emma's imagination. This would be a great book to use to learn about the circus or even families and the way they treat each other. There is a lot you can do with this book. It may even spark students interests to learn more about the circus and its history. I would recommend it to any K-2 grade teachers.

Reviewed by Kristina Smith

Noodleheads See The Future

Arnold, T., Hamilton, M., Weiss, M. Noodleheads see the future. 425 Madison Avenue, New York, NY: Holidayhouse Inc. 44 pages, Picture/Fiction/Inspirational, ISBN 978-0-8234-3673-6

This book contains life's lesson that are mostly found in our everyday circumstances. It uses two main characters named Mac which seems to be so gullible, and that they believe all things to be literal in meaning. For example, when their uncle asks if they could help him build a wall by saying, "can you give me a hand?" However, Mac and Mac interpreted it literally thus grasping the hand trying to cut it, so they can literally give Mac's hand to their uncle. And when their uncle says, "listen up" they literally listened turning their heads up and said that they could only hear birds chirping.

At first when I was reading the book I thought wow! This is funny and kind of silly, but it is true! There are some people in each walks of life that are easy to believe in what others would say, or sometimes would be too foolish to literally understand a statement word by word. This book would help kids understand how to be wise enough and not naïve in life. To understand that some people in life would take advantage of some others weaknesses and they have to be wise enough to at least notice that.




Reviewed by: Farah E.

The Warli People

Shin, H. (2017). The Warli People. Grand Rapids, Michigan: Eerdmans Books for Young Readers. 32 pages, 3-6 grade, picture, non-fiction, arts ISBN  978-0802854766

This book gives a short description about the Warli people and different life events that would transpire for them every year. Some of these life events would be the seasons or planting seeds, hunting, new life and the village at night. On each page is a short description of the event along with an some wall art which was known to be done by the woman of the tribe and was a sacred ritual for the Warli people. The book ends with a description of the Warli People in the very back along with key terms and concepts, the rise of civilization and more examples of Warli artwork.
This book is great to bring into the classroom to help children to gain new knowledge about different cultures and what life would have been like over 1,000 years ago. The illustrations are simple and show a lot of technique of the sacred ritual of drawing pictures that was part of the Warli people's culture. For me personally, the illustrations didn't draw me into the book as well as they could have. I do respect the illustrations and what they represent for the Warli people, they are just more difficult to understand what is going on with for me personally. The text is written in terms of seasons and major life events that happened for the Warli people in 10th Century BC. Once again, this is a great book to help students understand what life would be like 1,000 years ago.
Reviewed by: Karlie E.

The Great American Story of Charlie Brown, Snoopy, and the Peanuts Gang!

Perkins, C. (2017). The Great American Story of Charlie Brown, Snoopy, and the Peanuts Gang! New York: Simon Spotlight.

48 pages, Grade 1-3, Comics&Graphic Novel/ History, ISBN 9781481495547

Charles M. Schulz, the cartoonist of Charlie Brown, Snoopy, and the Peanuts gang, liked drawing since he was little. In high school, he took a cartoon course and even after graduating from high school, he continued drawing. His mother was very sick, and before he left for army service, she told him that if the family got another dog, they should name him Snoopy. After returning the army, he polished his cartooning skills. His comic strip named Peanuts was published by many newspaper companies and became very popular. The Peanuts gang was animated for a commercial for the Ford Motor Company. While a TV producer wanted to make a documentary about the comic strip, many TV networks did not want to broadcast the documentary. However, luckily, Coca-Cola wanted to sponsor a special program for the holiday season. Then, a Peanuts Christmas cartoon hit. Even after Charles passed away, the popularity of the Peanuts cartoons has never stopped.

 This book has information that probably many people do not know about Charlie Brown, Snoopy, and the Peanuts gang. It is was to know about the hidden story. It is surprising that many TV networks did not want to broadcast the documentary of the comic strip. I think Charles experienced a lot of excitement and anxiety in his life. This book explains about his life very briefly, but if you read it thinking what was going on at that time, you will realize that there were lots of dramas until the animation came out on TV. Yuki Konno

Silent Days, Silent Dreams

Say, A. (2017). Silent Days, Silent Dreams. New York: Arthur A. Levine Books.

63 Pages, K-12, Picture, Fictional Biography & Autobiography, 9780545927611

This story is about a boy name James Castle. He was born premature and it cause him deaf. He could not hear and speak. It was hard for him to find friends. He grew up and go to school and all he wants to do at school was drawing. He will fill his room with his drawings. He could not keep all his drawings because his family keep moving from place to place. Until his nephew took some of his drawings to University in Portland and the professors were interested and want to meet the artist. James meet the professor and some of his artist were display at the school and they were sold. Again, Bob Clay, director of Boise Gallery Art invite James and put up some of his art in a show at the gallery. Some of his drawings were sold too. James finally have his own dream house and he continues his artist in the Dream House.

I like this story because of the greatest themes that it teaches. “Do your best in what you do best” This lesson can also apply in different situation of life. Kids that loves to draw can receive inspiration from this story. I love the illustration of this book because each it shows some of James Castle’s art. I also like the illustration because every page and every statement has an image to describe what is also written. If some deaf student look at the story they can read the story using the picture only.

Reviewed by Ola.

Sundown kid

Bietz, B. (2016). Sundown kid. Place of publication not identified: August House Pub. 32 pages, K-2 grade, picture book, ISBN  978-1939160942

It is a story about a Jewish family move to a town in the Old West and they are the only Jewish family there. even though they faced different challenging from strangers, they still worked very hard to adapt their new life. Shabbat is very important in Jew. They made a lot of food to celebrate. Since they are the only Jewish family in the town, there was no one celebrate Shabbat with them. His mother said " too much soup, but not enough family." Then the boy had an idea to invite their new friends and neighbors for some good old-fashion chicken. They all had a wonderful time together and they knew about what is Shabbat.

I think it is a good book to teach students about celebration, diversity, and family. Nowadays, we all live in a diverse community that there are many different cultures surround us. This story told us that we should embrace different cultures. On the other hand, this book told us how a family look like in Jew. Teachers can use this example to compare different countries’ family to find out what are common or uncommon. Furthermore, this book can use to introduce different festival and discuss about how people celebrate their traditional festival. 

Reviewed by Karman A