LAURA INGALLS WILDER: GROWING UP IN THE LITTLE HOUSE by Patricia Rielly Giff

BIBLIOGRAPHY
Riely Giff, P. 1988. Laura Ingalls Wilder: Growing up in the Little House.
New York: Penguin Group. 0140320741


Plot Summary

Laura Ingalls Wilder was late in years and living on her farm in Missouri, when she looked back on her life and realized that she had had a most unbelievable series of adventures from the time when she was a very little girl, right until the time Text was about Laura Ingalls Wilder. This text was about how she and her family felt moving to the little house on the prairie. 

Critical Analysis

This text was dry and took a long time to read even though the text was short. Some chapters such as the politics and advertising were interesting, I still got bogged down. Take a look at the book from the political point of view of Wilder and at her daughter Rose Wilder Lane, a fascinating new way to take the reader in a new direction.

Reviews Experts

Publishers Weekly

Fans of Wilder's popular Little House books will want to turn to this biography to learn which parts of the stories actually happened. Beginning with the first book, set in the Big Woods of Wisconsin, Giff supplies the pertinent facts. Important events, she explains, such as the death of a baby brother and later, the death of Wilder's own child, were left out of the series. This spare account of Wilder's experiences has a reminiscent air; in an author's note, Giff says she wanted children to know "how difficult some of the times in Wilder's life really were." To this end her book is sadder than some of Wilder's fiction. Even after 20 years of journalism, Wilder felt "I didn't know how to write" and was asked to revise the first book, issued in 1932 when she was 65. Ages 7-11.

School Library Journal 

Grade 3-6 A brief biography of Laura Ingalls Wilder that may interest readers of the ``Little House'' (Harper) books. Obviously, a short biography of the author of nine autobiographical novels can't give readers much new information about her life. However, Giff does explain that Wilder started writing at age 65, after being encouraged by her daughter, Rose, and describes her life with Almanzo, the birth and death of a son, and her writing for local newspapers. Information about the Laura Ingalls Wilder award is sketchy at best, not stating that the award was first presented to Wilder, and stating that it is given ``to a children's author whose books are wonderful and loved by children.'' Giff includes quotes and facts from the ``Little House'' books, and her biography of the author should appeal to Wilder's fans.

CONNECTIONS

Laura Ingalls Wilder wrote great descriptions of the world she lived in. This is one of the reasons we know so much about what life was like for people in the 1880’s.

Compare and contrast Laura Ingalls Wilder:Growing up in the Little House to another book about Laura Ingalls Wilder.

Follow Laura’s example and write a descriptive paragraph about the world around you.

Write About the World Around You

Laura Elizabeth Ingalls Wilder (1867-1957) became one of the most beloved

children’s authors of all time when, in her sixties and seventies, she wrote the Little House series of novels. The novels were the inspiration for a long-running television series.

Giff wrote about how Wilder took the extraordinary things that happened in her life to develop the entire Little House Series that young girls all over fell in love with.

HATTIE BIG SKY Written by Kirby Larson

BIBLIOGRAPHY
Larson, K. 2006. HATTIE BIG SKY.
New York: Delacorte Press. ISBN: 0385903324

PLOT SUMMARY
The year is 1918 and a gutsy sixteen-year-old orphan, Hattie Brooks, is determined to achieve her dream. She has been shuttled from one distant relative to another tired of being Hattie Here-and-There, she summons the courage to leave Iowa and move all by herself to Vida, Montana. Hattie starts over in a big way when she takes on this challenge to finish "proving up" her uncle's homestead claim in Montana. Under the big sky country, Hattie braves hard weather, hard times, a cantankerous cow, and her own hopeless hand at the cookstove on her quest to discover the true meaning of home and carry on her late uncle's homestead.

CRITICAL ANALYSIS

This historical fiction text introduces readers to Hattie Brooks a young woman who is about to have her whole life changed again, but this time will be the last moving from place to place that she will have to endure. Hattie write to a friend who is fighting in World War I and sets the scene for her story through her letter. Hattie's childhood was marked by ever changing households, living with various relatives never knowing who or where she would wind up. As the reader becomes involved in this text, they learn that Hattie has received a letter from an uncle she hardly knows and he has left her is homestead in Vida, Montana. This event marks the beginning of a new adventure that would forever impact Hattie's life. The challenges Hattie faces give readers a strong heroine challenged by the tough environment in which she grows. Her emotional journey introduces her to great friends, forces her to make difficult decisions, and eventually guides her to a sense of independence. The trials and situations of her challenges cause her to become able to "prove up her claim", which is the homestead left to her. 
Kirby Larson, through tireless and thorough research, promises readers an accurate depiction of life for those who braved the challenges of land ownership in this time and region of U.S. history. The reader will follow this journey with Hattie from her train ride filled with hope to a Montana farm that exposes harsh realities and the beauty of Montana country. Larson has said that the book is patterned after a member of her family.

REVIEW EXCERPTS 

Booklist, Starred Review

Larson, whose great-grandmother homesteaded alone in Montana, read dozens of homesteaders’ journals and based scenes in the book on real events. Writing in figurative language that draws on nature and domestic detail to infuse her story with the sounds, smells, and sights of the prairie, she creates a richly textured novel full of memorable characters."

School Library Journal

"Larson creates a masterful picture of the homesteading experience and the people who persevered."

CONNECTIONS
This book would be a great historical fiction introduction to a unit on World War I.
It is also be used as a read aloud for the class. 
Students could choose to make this an independent reading that would allow for character analysis and problem-solution discussion.
Teachers could use this book to do an author's study to find out interesting ways that Kriby Larson researched to gain more insight into her family history.
This text is also available as an Audio Book so that the whole class could listen and review the book together.

One Crazy Summer - Rita Williams-Garcia

One Crazy Summer - Rita Williams-Garcia

BIBLIOGRAPHY

Williams-Garcia, R. 2010. ONE CRAZY SUMMER. New York: Amistad. ISBN 9780060760885.

PLOT SUMMARY

Eleven-year-old Delphine has it together. Even though her mother, Cecile, abandoned her and her younger sisters, Vonetta and Fern, seven years ago. Even though her father and Big Ma will send them from Brooklyn to Oakland, California, to stay with Cecile for the summer. And even though Delphine will have to take care of her sisters, as usual, and learn the truth about the missing pieces of the past.

When the girls arrive in Oakland in the summer of 1968, Cecile wants nothing to do with them. She makes them eat Chinese takeout dinners, forbids them to enter her kitchen, and never explains the strange visitors with Afros and black berets who knock on her door. Rather than spend time with them, Cecile sends Delphine, Vonetta, and Fern to a summer camp sponsored by a revolutionary group, the Black Panthers, where the girls get a radical new education.

CRITICAL ANALYSIS

 One Crazy Summer is a powerful story; round, believable characters we come to love; insight into a period of history from a perspective we probably haven’t heard before; expert and beautiful use of language; consistent and distinct ways of talking that help us understand each character as an individual; and a story that leaves you warmed and smiling, with deepened understanding and with things to think about. Rita Williams-Garcia understands what it takes to capture an audience when it comes to characterization.This is a book that will stick with you. Each character in this text is uniquely written, they holds up in dialogue and are completely immersed in the story that Rita Williams-Garcia has put them in. It is a beautiful thing and translates into fluid and poetic narrative. This historical fiction text has a great story and history lesson rolled into one. It portrays a time in history that young readers of today may not be able to understand without a text such as this. It's one of those reads that you just don't want to put down. You want to continue to know what is going to happen to Delphine. This book is also offered as an audio book for those who like to read on the go (as you're driving!).

REVIEW EXCERPTS


School Library Journal
Emotionally challenging and beautifully written, this book immerses readers in a time and place and raises difficult questions of cultural and ethnic identity and personal responsibility. With memorable characters (all three girls have engaging, strong voices) and a powerful story, this is a book well worth reading and rereading.—Teri Markson, Los Angeles Public Library




Booklist
Set during a pivotal moment in African American history, this vibrant novel shows the subtle ways that political movements affect personal lives; but just as memorable is the finely drawn, universal story of children reclaiming a reluctant parent’s love. Grades 4-7. --Gillian Engberg


 Kirkus Reviews
“Delphine is the pitch-perfect older sister, wise beyond her years, an expert at handling her siblings...while the girls are caught up in the difficulties of adults, their resilience is celebrated and energetically told with writing that snaps off the page”




CONNECTIONS


Language Arts, collaborate with the Social Studies/History.  This book is a fabulous tie-in for the Civil Rights Movement in American History.


1. Create timelines that compare actual Black Panther events with those described in One Crazy Summer.  Research the time when the Black Panthers started the children's programs in Oakland. The timelines could include important historical events that happened from 1968 such as Martin Luther King Jr.'s death to the end of that movement.
2. Research the key players of the Black Panthers, such as Huey P. Newton, Eldridge Cleaver, and Bobby Hutton.  Include other historical figures from the time period.
3. Compare and contrast the positive and negative decisions made by the Panthers.  Discuss what they did that worked and what they could have done better.
4. Compare the beliefs of Martin Luther King Jr., Malcolm X, and The Black Panthers.  How are they alike? Dislike?
5. Review poetry, music, and movies from the 1960's.  Have students write their own poetry and lyrics about things they believe strongly.  
6. Encourage the students to write a play or make a video that demonstrates the conflicts experienced by Delphine, Vonetta, and Fern within the larger conflicts of the United States during that time.