Wednesday, July 17, 2013

Summer Reading: Can You Dig It?

Holes by Louis Sachar (RL 5.1).  If you take a bad boy and make him dig a hole every day in the hot sun, it will turn him into a good boy.  That was what some people thought.  And here is what we think on the Book Beach: if we take a good book and read it every day in the shade, it will turn us into bright and happy summer readers! 
  
An Unlikely Hero: Overweight, bullied, and haunted by a curse that has brought bad luck to his family for generations, Stanley Yelnats IV is wrongly accused of theft and sent to Camp Green Lake, a juvenile detention center near a not-so-green and dried-up lake in Texas.
  
Soon, Stanley begins to question the motives of the camp warden who forces resident boys to dig five-foot-deep holes in the scorching Texas sun as punishment.  Holes, winner of the 1999 Newbery Medal, is a story about self-discovery, friendship... and buried treasure!


We can play the Holes Match ‘Em Up Challenge or test our skill at the Holes Green Lake Treasure Hunt. Just click on the blue-highlighted words to get started.

Lafayette Principal Mrs. Russo recommends Holes for summer reading fun.  She "loves how the story moves back and forth between the legendary curse and the current time—and how it all connects in the end.”  
Mrs. Russo shares that she will be reading and relaxing in beautiful Bar Harbor, Maine, this summer... and perhaps digging for buried treasure in her own backyard!



Also from Louis Sachar: 
A Sideways Series to Read When We’re Not in School! 
   
Sideways Stories from Wayside School (RL 3.9) presents comical episodes from the thirtieth-floor classroom of a school that was accidentally constructed sideways, with one crazy classroom-- and lots of crazy stories-- on each story.  
In Wayside School is Falling Down (RL 3.9), students learn to tango, deal with the cafeteria’s dreaded mushroom surprise, and study a hobo during show-and-tell.  
In Wayside School Gets a Little Stranger (RL 3.3), Pet Day brings dogs and cats, frogs, skunks and pigs... and a pet orange named Fido to the school.  More surprisingly, favorite teacher Mrs. Jewls is expecting a baby.  That means a substitute teacher is coming....





Sideways Movie Poster from Lafayette School!

We can learn more about Louis Sachar and his books.  
Click on the blue-highlighted words to visit the author's website!


A Super Story to Read 
When We’re Not in School!   

Powerless by Matthew Cody (RL 5.3).  After moving to small-town Noble's Green, Pennsylvania, twelve-year-old Daniel learns that his new friends have extraordinary powers that they will lose when they turn thirteen... unless he can use his regular-kid brain power to protect them!  



Check out a book commercial for Powerless
created by Tamer L: 




From Holes... to Whole Nother Stories?

A Whole Nother Story by Dr. Cuthbert Soup (RL 5.6).  Ethan Cheeseman and his children, ages eight, twelve, and fourteen, hope to make a home in a small, quiet town-- at least long enough to complete work on their LVR-ZX time machine.  Sneaky spies and government agents have been chasing the family, however, and they are about to catch up:

 


Another Whole Nother Story, also by Dr. Cuthbert Soup (RL 6.0).  Ethan Cheeseman time travels with his children—and Captain Jibby and crew—to the year 1668 to put an end to an ancient family curse and to save the children's mother.  Damage to the time machine and the arrival of Mr. 5, however, complicate the adventurers’ return.

No Other Story by-- you guessed it-- Dr. Cuthbert Soup (RL 6.6).  When Mr. Cheeseman and his three smart, polite, and relatively odor-free children travel to the not-so-distant-past, they meet something weirder and wilder than anything they've encountered in their earlier adventures. They are about to meet... alternate versions of themselves! 


Buried Treasure, Sideways Schools, Super Powers,
Time Travelers... Let's Dig into Summer Reading!

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