The Mysterious Collection of Dr. David Harleyson

Genre: Modern Fantasy/Folk Tales
Author: Jean Cassels

Summary: The story is told by the nephew of a famous painter, Dr. David Harleyson, as he and his father searches for his uncle through a collection of a dozen paintings painted in the last year. Most of the story is told through what the nephew finds on the back of each paintings which includes letters to and from whomever is painted on the canvas, tickets to shows, passports, telegrams and newspaper clippings. The nephew must find all twelve paintings and put them in order so that when the nephew visits his Uncle abroad the paintings will go to their rightful owners. The nephew find the last letter from his uncle that explains a marriage between Dr. David Harleyson and Miss Lill Pigg in which the nephew and his father is invited to attend.

Lesson: The author writes that the twelve paintings are based off of animals and stories from Grimm, Aesop and Mother Goose. For my lesson, I would have my class divided up in 12 groups with each group responsible for learning a tale from one of the paintings in this book, such as the Itsy Bitsy Spider and the Hare and the Tortoise. Each group would be responsible in reading and three different types of the same folk tale and then present the differences to the class with a brief summary of the folk tale.

Tuck Everlasting

Genre: Modern Fantasy Chapter Book
Author: Natalie Babbitt

Summary: Tuck Everlasting is a story about a young girl named Winifred, Winnie, Foster who has grown up in a wealthy family in the 1940s. She is the only child of her parents and their well manicured lawn is bordered by a tall fence that Winnie feels like she is trapped inside.Winnie runs away from her stifling parents by going into the woods her family owns that she has never visited. Once there, Winnie happens across a boy who is a bit older than her that is drinking from a spring by a tree. The boy, Jesse, blocks Winnie's attempts to get some of the water as well, which the readers later find out to be a special spring of water for eternal life. Jesse brings Winnie back to his family, who lives out in the woods, to protect their secret lifestyle, that is, that they will never die. Winnie begins to grow close to the Tuck family but trouble comes when a man in a yellow suit is determined to tell the town that the Tucks have kidnapped Winnie. The man in the yellow suit only cares for the water in the spring and is later killed by Mae Tuck, who ends up in the town's jail. Mae escapes her hanging the night before she is due to die with the help of the Tuck boys and Winnie. The Tucks leave town and when they finally come back, find out that Winnie chose to live life rather than drink the spring water and she dies before they return.

Lesson: I would have my students read this book in small groups of about five or so students, each student having their own book. They would be assigned to read a certain amount of pages a day for homework along with thinking of discussion questions and thoughts that they can share the next day while they are in their groups.

The Trouble with Henry: A Tale of Walden Pond

Genre: Historical Fiction
Authors: Deborah O'Neal and Angela Westengard

Summary: This story is set in Concord, Massachusetts during the time when mills and machines were beginning to become popular. The story is set around nonfiction person Henry David Thoreau and his love for nature rather than the busy city. In this story, David is thought to be the oddball of the town since he is not in love with buying all the newest clothing and items like everyone else in the town. Henry decides to move out to Walden Pond and build himself a small house so that he can get away from the smog filled town of Concord. Though Henry loves his new abode, the town and its mayor is coming up with a way to demolish the woods where Henry lives by replacing it with a toothpick factory. Only after David brings the town full of coughing, tired, sneezing people into the woods so that they can listen and view the true beauty of nature do the citizens decide to not go through with their plan to demolish the woods.


Lesson: After reading this book, I would have my students take a walk around the grounds of the school. I grew up with an elementary school that had wonderful grounds that included numerous gardens and woods to explore so I would hope to have a school like this so that I could take my students out to explore nature. My only instructions for students would be for them to focus their attention on the sounds, views, textures, etc of nature so that when they get back into the classroom, they could write a letter to the toothpick mill as if they were a citizen explaining the wonders of Walden Woods.

The Bunyans

Genre: Folk Literature/Tall Tale
Author: Audrey Wood

Summary: This story is about Paul Bunyan's life after all the stories about him growing up. Paul meets another giant named Carrie, who he falls in love with instantly, and they marry. The couple then has two children, Little Jean and Teeny, and the story follows the family as the children grow up. As the reader follows along to the Bunyans' life, they are told why numerous things are the way that they are in America, such as the Rocky Mountains, which the story tells Carrie Bunyan created to keep her children closer to home.

Lesson: I would read a tall tale about Paul Bunyan first and then read students this story as it continues on his fictional life. I would have students find something remarkable about the landscape of the United States and then have the students draw it and write a story about which Bunyan created. I would have students come to me so that I could agree with their story and landscape before they write it so that each student has something different to write about. After all the students have created this short story about a Bunyan and their landscape, I would collect everyone's story and put it together as a book made by the class on the Bunyans' life.

LaRue for Mayor: Letters from the Campaign Trail

Genre: Modern Fantasy
Author: Mark Teague

Summary: This book is told in articles from the city's local newspaper and also in letters written by Ike LaRue, a dog, to his owner who is in the hospital. The book is set in Snort City where the election for Mayor is in the running, the major candidate being Hugo Bugwort. After Ike and his friends are seen around town causing havoc, Bugwort decides that his campaign will be centered around getting rid of dogs in the Snort City. This causes LaRue to decide to also run as a candidate, and with help from his buddies, begins to become a popular candidate. After Ike LaRue "saves" Bugwort, Bugwort makes up his mind that dogs are good for the city and asks Ike LaRue to join him as Assistant Mayor of the town, which LaRue accepts.

Lesson: I would read this story while doing a unit in social studies about local politics. I would read the story allowed and then have the students discuss aspects of the story that they have already learned about, such as the terms candidates, election, mayor, and so forth. I would then have the students write one more letter to Mrs. LaRue as if they were Ike, explaining how life is like being the Assistant Mayor of Snort City.

Rapunzel

Genre: Folk Literature
Author: Stephanie Peters

Summary:

Lesson: I would divide my class up in groups of three or four students. I would assign each group a folk literature book like Rapunzel and also a Flip camera. The students would have to create a short video, up to five minutes, that they designed and would present to their class that gave a summary of the folk tale. They could make a skit, a slide show with the camera, or anything else creative that would help them teach their classmates about the folk tale.

How to Survive Middle School

Genre: Chapter Book
Author: Donna Gephart

Summary: How to Survive Middle School is told by David Greenberg, a boy who loves to make videos based off his favorite show The Daily Show. After a summer that did not go anywhere near as planned, David is left without his best friend, who is now his enemy, to start sixth grade while also missing his mother who left his family two years ago. David gets suspended his first day in class and detention the following day due to a fight and also being late to his first class with Ms. Lovely. David stops getting into trouble but continues to feel lonely at the big middle school where his only friend is a new girl named Sophie. The story continues along as David's online YouTube videos begin to get popular with the local and state newspaper coming to interview him while David's school life is miserable. After David gets a dreaded swirlie by the bully Tommy and his whole class seeing him dripping toilet water in the hall, David runs home to find his hamster, Hammy, the last gift from his mom, dead. After this, David's life begins to get better as his old best friend, who was friends with Tommy the bully, is now back friends with David. David's video also inspired the school's newscast to invite David to join the cast once or twice a week along with David's video being shown on his all time favorite show, The Daily Show.

Lesson: I would read this book to my class if I had a fifth grade class. I would start reading it in the last few months of the school year and have discussions after reading different sections to the class. I'm sure my fifth grade class would be getting nervous to start middle school so I think that this book would allow them to see sixth grade as an adventure. Some discussions would deal with what they should do if they are being bullied such as when Tommy and his friends are bullying David.