Dark Emperor and Other Poems of the Night by Joyce Sidman, Illustrated by Rick Allen

Dark Emperor and Other Poems of the Night by Joyce Sidman, Illustrated by Rick Allen

Summary: In this book of poems, the inner workings of the Night Life of nature comes alive. There are 12 poems, each one of them covering what life is like at night. Also, accompanying each poem is a brief paragraph about the subject of the poem or a creature of the night.. The first poem, Welcome to the Night, welcomes in the creatures that come out at night, and the animal facts on this page are about the nocturnal raccoon. The second poem, Snail at Moonrise, describes what a snail does, how it moves, and why it moves. The animal facts paragraph covers the Snail. The third poem and subject of the animal fact paragraph is, Love Poem of the Primrose Moth, which describes what a primrose moth is and what it does at night.Next, is the poem, Dark Emperor, which is about the Great Horned Owl, same as the animal fact paragraph. Then it is oak After Dark, which is about trees and how they look and what they mean to the nocturnal animals. This fact paragraph talks about the plethora of life that goes on in a tree during the day and at night. Following this poem is Night Spider’s Advice, which talks about the spiders the crawl in the night. The fact paragraph says that Spiders can work both in the day and in the night. The seventh poem is I am a Baby Porcupette, a porcupette is another name for a baby porcupine, as it says in the fact paragraph. The eighth poem is Cricket Speaks, which describes the life of a cricket, as does the animal fact paragraph. Next is another plant life, The Mushrooms Come, which tells of where mushrooms come from. The fact paragraph discusses how they are fungi and the purpose they have in this ecosystem. After the Mushrooms is the Ballad of the Wandering Eft. From this poem you learn how an eft moves and what it must feel like. In the fact paragraph you learn that and Eft is in fact a newt and why they move around at night. And now we have the Bat Wraps Up poem, which is about bats, of course. The poems describes what is must be like to be a bat and the fact paragraph tells you all about these nocturnal creatures. And last, but not least there is the poem Moon’s Lantern, which talks about one of the most important parts of the night, the Moon. The fact paragraphs tells all about how important the Moon and it’s light is to the creatures of the night. The book ends with a glossary, just clear a few things up.

Review: Introducing this book to young reader learned about animal nightlife would be so exciting. The poems are vivid descriptions of each animal, the illustrations are beautifully eye-catching. One of my favorite part of the book is the fact paragraphs on the side of each illustration and the glossary at the end of the books, which students can use as they learn how to use dictionaries and glossaries in textbooks. The appropriate age range for this books is from 6-9, however, I feel that the younger ones will enjoy this book as well.

The War That Saved My Life by Kimberly Brubaker Bradley

The War That Saved My Life by Kimberly Brubaker Bradley

Summary: Ada lives in London, England with her brother Jamie and her Mom, in a small one bedroom apartment. While Jamie gets to go out and play with the other lane children who also not in school yet, Ada is forbidden to leave her flat, she is not even allowed to walk. However, if she could walk, play outside, and go to school her bad foot would be in too much pain for her to do it long. Ada was born with a club foot, and because of this her Mom will not let her leave, or walk, or go to school. Ada's Mom is mean and makes her cook, clean, and take care of her little brother Jamie, but she can look out the window all the way down to the street. Sitting by the widnow is how Ada learned about Hitler and the War, also how they the schools were sending the students away from London because the war meant bombs in London. So Ada hatched a plan to learn  how to walk and go with Jamie to the country. When time came, Ada walked, although it hurt her very much, with Jamie to the train station where all the other children and school teachers were getting ready to board. On the way to Kent, London Ada sees a womon riding a horse. Ada, doesn't know why but she knows that feeling of going so fast that everything is passing you by and so she decides that she will learn to ride a horse and jump a wall just like the woman did. When they finally arrive, Ada ada and Jamie are the last ones to get picked up, and even then the woman in charge took them down to a house where the womone argued with her saying that she did not wany children. However, the woman in charge told the other woman that she had to. The woman's name was Ms.Smith and although she said she was  not nice, she was. She made sure that Ada and Jamie were clean, fed, and healthy. Ms. Smith  let Ada play oustsied, gave her crutches so she could walk, made sure theher bad foot was wrapped. Ada;s favorite thing about being with Ms. Smith was that she had a horse named butter and she let Ada go outside and play with him. Eventually as Jamie went to school and Ms. Smith was in her room or shopping, Ada began to teach her self how to ride butter. After a while, the London Mothers began to pick up their children and take them back home, but no mattr how many times Ms. Smith wrote to Ada's and Jamie's Mom, she would never reply. As Ada and Jamie and Ms. Smith started to act like a family, the War got worse There was even an Air base a cross the sreet from them. Although, that was exciting event, there much more terrifying ones.The Fist one was when Dunkirk happened and all the soldier were imported to Kent so that they could go to another base, but too many to many of them had come and so Ada and her friend Daisy helped injured soldiers on Daisy's mom's pub. The second was the air raids. Ms. Smith, or Susan as she insisted Ada call her, Jamie and Ada, had to hide in the shelter that some men and boys from from the town went around and built everyone. The third event was rather excited but also quire frighting. Ada turned in a Spy and the whole town loved her for it, but it made everything much more real to Ada. Once as Ada was coming back from riding butter, her mom was there talking to Susan and holding Jamie's hand. Susan tried convince their mom to let them stay with her but took them home so that she wouldn't have to pay the weekly allowance she did not realize she had to pay. When they got back to London, Ada and Jamie found that their mom had moved into a slighty nicer apartment and got a new job at the factory. However, their mom was still mean and all Ada and Jamie wanted to do was go back to Kent with Ms. Susan. So, Ada did something she always wanted to do, she stood up to their mom and told them that she was leaving and was going to take Jamie with her. And because it didn't cost anything to her, their mom left to work, agreeing to let Ada and Jamie go. Soon after, bombs started falling from the sky and Ada and Jamie ran to the nearst shelter. After everything stoped Ada decded that now was the time to leave and as they were walking out, they found susan walking in the street. Susan had come back for them. Once they were all back in Kent they found that Susan's house was gon after a bomb had landed on her home. There stading, looking throught he rubble were all the friends that Susan, Jamie and Ada had made and they were happy to see them. Everybody was safe and where they were where they belonged.

Review: This book I would say is appropriate for 9 to 12 year olds. I loved this book very much and even plan on reading the sequel very soon. I would love to put it in my classroom, but because the character in the story is abused by her mother and she has PTSD episodes, the children may not understand it and some parents may not find it appropriate. For this reason I would ask the parents of the students in my classroom, about their concerns and if they would feel comfortable reading it. I would still have it as an option for thise students who are allowed to read it , I would just need to be aware of the students who are not allowed to. The War that Saved My Life is beautifuly written and teaches children about what life was life for some children during World War II.