Middle Grade – Snap Book Reviews

July 3, 2018August 2, 2018

Chill with Ice Age Fiction

Caveboy Dave: More Scrawny Than Brawny by Aaron Reynolds, Phil McAndrew
Published by Viking Books for Young Readers
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Almost 12-year-old Dave Unga-Bunga is a scrawny, brainy kid in a brawny, prehistoric world. Hulking and hairy Mr. Gronk, Dave’s Hunting 101 teacher, desperately tries to get his class ready for their coming of age, Baby-Go-Boom quest to kill one of the big six deadly predators: Slothopod, Pokeyhorn, Rippy-Beak, Blobby-Goo, Slugasaurus, or the notorious Stabby-Cat.

Cowboy Dave excerpt It’s a go-big or go-home situation—either bring back one of the enormous dead critters or don’t come home at all. Dave and his companions realize that they have to cooperate and get creative to return victorious from their quest.

This action-packed, hilarious graphic novel offers surprisingly compassionate and poignant messages about individuality and self-acceptance.

There is no need for setting up the story for kids– just hand them the book!

The Race Against Time (Geronimo Stilton Journey Through Time #3) by Geronimo Stilton, Danilo Barozzi, Silvia Bigolin, Christian Aliprandi, Andrea Denegri, Beth Dunfey, Julia Heim
Published by Scholastic Paperbacks
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Geronimo Stilton is a graphic novel series that relies on detailed illustrations, vibrant fonts, and an endless supply of cheese/mouse/cat puns to tell the wild travels of a cautious but curious mouse newspaper editor and his entourage of family and friends.

In The Race Against Time, Geronimo and his crew hop through Professor von Volt’s Paw Pro Portal to visit the Ice Age, ancient Greece, and the Renaissance and make mini-stops in the worlds of Genghis Khan, Blackbeard, and locomotive designer, George Stevenson.

Hands-on activities and fun quizzes appear at the end of the book. The Ice Age activity is making a bear claw necklace with string and clay.

Kids who become discouraged with endless black and white text are energized by the colorized words that break up the text. Non-stop action and humor make this a kid-favorite series.

Boy of the Painted Cave by Justin Denzel
Published by Puffin Books
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This author imagines the lives of the early people who painted the caves of southern France. We follow the life of Tao, a fourteen year-old boy with a turned in foot who secretly draws the animals that surround him.

Tao doesn’t know who his father is, and his mother died when he was young. The old and wise Kala, with no children of her own, took him in when the rest of the clan rejected him.

Tao befriends another outcast, a wolf pup and ventures into the forbidden Slough, a place that the elders claim is inhabited by demons.

Tao dares to brave the Slough alone, to draw forbidden images, and to follow his heart.

This is a story of courage and survival.

The target audience is middle grade, and is perfect to read with your child. It’s a bit slow at first but then roars to a breath-taking end.

Maroo of the Winter Caves by Ann Turnbull
Published by HMH Books for Young Readers
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This story takes place during the last Ice Age. Although Maroo and her family live in a constant struggle to survive starvation, freezing temperatures, and fierce predators, they experience family and community in the same ways as we do today.

She and her older brother quarrel, they beg their parents to keep a stray dog, they mourn the sudden death of a family member who provided love and protection, they sing and dance and tease each other. The clan respects Old Mother’s wisdom, guidance, and tough decisions.

After spending the summer near the ocean, the group splits up because Maroo’s mother must stop and give birth. Everyday they wait, the first group gets further ahead on the trail.

Tragedy strikes when Maroo’s father is killed in a hunting accident and the only other adult hunter is injured.

Can Maroo and younger brother, Otak, find their way through a blizzard, survive the Pass of the Spirits, and locate the rest of the community at the Winter Camp, the only hope for rescue of Maroo’s family?

A girl hero. An unforgiving environment. Vivid imagery. Beautiful prose. Maroo of the Winter Caves is a teacher favorite for for sixth grade, which means harsh book reviews from sixth grade students.

Read this title together.

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June 20, 2018June 20, 2018

Sliding Into the Ice Age for Summer Reading

saber tooth Kids will leap from the sweltering summer heat and slide into the bone-chilling, fight-or-flight, glacier dominated landscape of the Ice Age. A place where our hunter-gatherer ancestors considered an unoccupied cave as adequate shelter and a Mammoth bone hut as upscale. Anyone living until 35 was elderly, and every day of survival was a win.

Populated with outrageously sized saber-toothed cats, Wooly Mammoths, and twelve-foot cave bears (who could run at an incredible 40 mph), this frozen time period produced some of the oddest looking animals imaginable. Ancient Sloth

Take the giant Ground Sloth (Megatherium) that was roughly the size of a modern day elephant. It was 20 feet tall and weighed a hefty 2,200 pounds.

Ancient Armadillo Or the giant armadillo of South America, (Glyptodon), over ten feet long and swung a lethal, spiky tail for protection.

A predecessor of the elephant, the Amebelodon, had a trunk like an elephant but tusks that curve downward. Ancient Elephant

Are you ready to explore the Ice Age?

Set the Stage.

Start with this stunning 2-minute clip from the LaBrea Tar Pits and Titans of the Ice Age 3-D. The whole website is worth an exploration and it lays the foundation for reading.

Next, explore hands-on examples of Ice Age animals. I prefer a company, Safariltd, that bills itself as offering “Toys that Teach.” The figures are textured and high quality. They are also sold at Amazon and Michael’s.

Let’s get to the books.

Sliding Into the Ice Age for Summer Reading

You Wouldn't Want to Be a Mammoth Hunter!: Dangerous Beasts You'd Rather Not Encounter by John Malam, David Antram, David Salariya
Published by Children's Press(CT)
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This title is from a kid sought series that uses wacky illustrations to view harsh but realistic conditions of life during specific eras. Kids will learn about the Ice Age without realizing it.

How do you track the mammoth herds? Look for the vegetation that they prefer and follow the tracks and dung that are the size of your head. Even better, when sneaking up on a mammoth herd, cover yourself with the stinky stuff to mask your human scent.

The text also covers food, shelter, clothing, cave art, typical injuries, and burial practices. Most libraries carry titles in the You Wouldn’t Want to be a …. series, and I’ve used this with several tutoring students, making this a “worth every penny” purchase.

What Was the Ice Age? by Nicolas David Medina, David Groff
Published by Penguin Workshop
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This New York Times best selling series is like reading the Reader’s Digest version of a Wikipedia entry except that the text and formatting are decipherable and the information is fact-checked. They are quick and easy to reference and they lay the foundation for further learning.

The illustrations give us a quick run through of the animals that roamed the earth at that time along with a healthy appreciation of what shelter, food, and fire meant to early humans. Sixteen pages of black and white photos, Ice and World timelines, and a bibliography offer starting points for further learning.

by David Antram, David Groff, David Salariya, John Malam, Mark Dubowski, Nicolas David Medina
Published by Children's Press(CT), Penguin Workshop, Random House Books for Young Readers
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This is a detailed history of plant and animal life that defies words. Exquisite illustrations, high school level text, a reference book that I invested in and don’t lend out. Starting with the birth of the universe, Prehistoric Life through early humans.

The last few chapters cover the Ice Age plants, animals, geography, and humans. Each animal and plant entry is visually compared to the size a human hand, thumb, or six foot man. You will see renditions of the giant beavers who were eight feet long and weighed 220 pounds. The Australian giant monitor lizard, Megalania, the top predator, munched on giant kangaroos, wombats, Thylacoleo (a marsupial lion), and probably people.

Stunning photos of the cave paintings in southern France bring these early people closer to us. We can only marvel at their ability to survive and to create art that reveals the peril and the beauty of their everyday lives.

I have never seen so many unusual plants and animals in one book. Kids can spend hours just absorbed in the pictures. You could easily tie this in with Jurassic World movies.

Discovery in the Cave by Mark Dubowski, Mark Dubowski
Published by Random House Books for Young Readers
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A nonfiction leveled reader aimed at grades 2-3. Discovery in the Cave tells the story of 17-year-old Marcel Ravidat who discovered the prehistoric paintings on the walls of the cave Lascaux, France.

Connect this simplified version of Ravidat’s discovery with information from other texts to add layers of learning about Ice Age peoples.

Provide pencil, paper, water colors, clay, any medium to recreate this world.

Ice Mummy: The Discovery of a 5,000 Year-Old Man by Mark Dubowski, Mark Dubowski
Published by Random House Books for Young Readers
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Another leveled reader, the story of the Ice Mummy is equal parts fascinating and horrifying. The authors provide compelling scientific evidence about his way of life, including a reconstruction of scientists’ best guess as to what this man looked like. Experts are certain that he had a last meal of pollen and dried meat which he carried in a leather pouch and that he was shot with an arrow through the back and suffered a blow to the head either to finish him off or less likely that he hit his head.

This is a book that I just hand to a student and the content drives them.

For more information, National Geographic offers 5 fascinating facts about him. [Spoiler: the Ice Man had hardening of the arteries!]

To promote the joy of reading:

1. Ask authentic questions and listen closely to the answers.

2. Let curiosity power learning and reading.

3. Share your reactions. You would be surprised by how much you will learn.

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June 4, 2018June 20, 2018

Auma’s Long Run

An incredible read. A book that I purchased, recommend, and share.

Auma's Long Run by Eucabeth A. Odhiambo
Published by Carolrhoda Books
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1980’s Kenya, 13-year-old Auma wants answers: Why is her father not returning to his job in the city? What is causing this mysterious illness that people in the village call Slim? Why is her mother silent and withdrawn after taking Auma’s father to the doctor?

The one place where Auma can get answers is school, a place where the teachers are strict (students get hit with a cane in the back of the legs if they are late, “no excuses” is the rule), but at least they give the students accurate information about the transmission and inevitable course of AIDS.

Auma faces the daily struggle of keeping her siblings in school and alive after the suffering and deaths of first her father and then her mother. Auma and her mother have their most difficult, honest, and courageous conversation near the end of her mother’s life.

The author, Eucabeth A. Odhiambo, draws from her own experiences and her work with children affected by AIDS in Kenya. She calls these children heroes, and children like Auma have the fortitude and courage to survive and to keep their siblings alive as well.

Odhiambo’s writing is genuine, clear, even. We get a clear sense of the struggles that children and women face in a society that gives them few options, but the story is uplifting. Auma relies on her best friend, her grandmother, and other women in the community to prevail in getting an education and a track scholarship.

My hope is that Odhiambo continues writing Auma’s story and that we find out if she fulfills her dream to become a doctor dedicated to helping her people fight AIDS.

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