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FROG AND TOAD ARE FRIENDS
BY ARNOLD LOBEL
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THE BOXCAR CHILDREN: THE MYSTERY OF THE MIXED UP ZOO
BY GERTRUDE CHANDLER WARNER
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BEEZUS AND RAMONA
BY BEVERLY CLEARLY
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THE TIME MACHINE
BY H.G. WELLS
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DINOSAUR DETECTIVES
BY JOANNA COLE
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BRIDGE TO TERABITHIA
BY KATHERINE PATERSON
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THE BEST SCHOOL YEAR EVER
BY BARBARA ROBINSON
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IRA SLEEPS OVER
BY BERNARD WEBER
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MINNIE AND MOO MEET FRANKENSWINE
BY DENYS CAZET
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ZATHURA
BY CHRIS VAN ALLSBURG
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JUMANJI
BY CHRIS VAN ALLSBURG
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THE MAGIC SCHOOL BUS – VOYAGE TO THE VOLCANO
BY JUDITH STAMPER
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SONG LEE AND THE LEECH MAN
BY SUZY KLINE
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HORRIBLE HARRY AND THE GREEN SLIME
BY SUZY KLINE
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HERBIE JONES SAILS INTO SECOND GRADE
BY SUZY KLINE
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MOLLY'S PILGRIM
BY BARBARA COHEN
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STREGA NONA
BY TOMIE de PAOLA
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DEAR MR. HENSHAW
BY BEVERLY CLEARLY
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CHARLOTTES WEB
BY E.B. WHITE
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BECAUSE OF WINN DIXIE
BY KATE DICAMILLO
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FROGGY PLAYS IN THE BAND
BY JONATHAN LONDON
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THE LEGEND OF THE INDIAN PAINTBRUSH
BY TOMIE de PAOLA
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JAMES AND
THE GIANT PEACH
BY ROALD DAHL
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THE LITTLES GO EXPLORING
BY JOHN PETERSON
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FRECKLE JUICE
BY JUDY BLUME
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CHARLIE AND THE CHOCOLATE FACTORY
BY ROALD DAHL
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JUNIE B. JONES, 1ST GRADER AT LAST
BY BARBARA PARK
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FUDGE-A-MANIA
BY JUDY BLUME
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RAMONA THE BRAVE
BY BEVERLY CLEARLY
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I DON'T WANT TO GO BACK TO
SCHOOL BY
MARISABINA RUSSO
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This stories main characters include Fudge, Pete, Tootsie Hatcher and
Sheila "Queen of Cooties" Tubman. Their parents decide to spend their
summer vacation in the woods of Maine right next door to each
other--but "next door" turns out to be in the same house. Fast-paced
mayhem becomes the order of the day as children, adults (including
Grandma Hatcher and Grandpa Tubman), and assorted pets find themselves
in daily (hourly?) predicaments. Not to be outdone in the madcap pace,
Grandma and Grandpa announce their intention to be married. The story
concludes with the solemn pact between Pete and Sheila that even though
they'll be related, they will always hate each other.
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Andrew Marcus wants freckles like Nicky Lane because his mother would
never notice that his neck was dirty. Sharon said her family had a
secret recipe for freckle juice and she would sell it to Andrew for 50
cents. Andrew thinks about the deal and then the next day at school he
buys the freckle juice. Sharon throws the recipe onto the ground and
when Andrew tries to pick it up, he falls on the ground. Miss Kelly,
his teacher calls him up to her desk, takes the recipe and reads it.
She says she will give it back to him at 3 o'clock. Andrew gets the
recipe and makes the freckle juice at his house. He smells it and it
smells horrible. He drinks a sip and spits it out. Andrew then drinks
the whole glass of freckle juice. The next day he doesn't have
freckles. Andrew goes to his art bin and opens the drawer and looks for
a brown magic marker. He finds a blue magic marker and puts freckles on
his face with the magic marker. He goes to school with the freckles on
his face. Miss Kelly gives him a freckle remover recipe to help him get
the magic marker off his face.
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While first grade offers a whole year of exciting possibilities for
Junie B., things get off to a confusing start. Feeling tentative about
her new teacher, she renames him Mr. Scary. Her last year's best friend
now has two new best friends and her old bus pal has a new buddy. Then,
Junie's teacher discovers that she needs glasses. Now that is something
to worry about. "What if Room One laughs their head off at me? What if
I look like a goonie bird and no one wants to be my friend?" However,
her classmates, who already agree that twins with rhyming names, a boy
with a spiky gel hairdo, and bilingual Jose’ are fascinating, determine
that Junie B. and her purple glasses are definitely cool.
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The Time Machine by H.G Wells is a very interesting book that always
keeps you guessing what will happen next. The book is about the Time
Traveler who is a very intelligent scientist,and makes a time machine
to travel to the future. He travels all the way to the year 803,701,
where he meets these friendly and care free creatures called the Eloi.
The Time Traveler also makes a friend with one of Eloi, and her name is
Weena. Weena is the first to introduce that the Eloi have fears, and
that fear is the darkness. The Time Traveler then learns about the
malicious creatures, the Morlocks, that stole the Time Traveler’s time
machine. The rest of the book is just about the Time Traveler getting
his time machine back from the morlocks ,and him returning back to his
own time.
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In "Frog and Toad Are Friends" the book consists of roughly five short
stories. The first is one of my favorites. In it, Frog has decided to
wake Toad from his hibernation and introduce him to the new spring.
Toad's response is, "Blah". Frog tries a number of different methods of
luring his friend into the warm beautiful day, the most touching of
which is his simple argument, "But, Toad, I will be lonely". Frog's
eventual solution is to fast-forward Toad's calendar a little, making
it instantly May. Toad is a little shocked at the date but he's happy
to see the spring weather. In the second tale, Frog is sick and Toad
attempts to take care of him. His different methods of coming up with a
story to tell his friend inevitably lead to his own illness, however,
and soon it is Frog telling Toad a story instead. The story "A Lost
Button" shows Frog and Toad out looking for Toad's lost button. They
find a variety of them but none are Toad's. He walks off in a huff only
to find the missing item on his living room floor. Feeling guilty about
yelling at his best friend he sews all the buttons onto his jacket and
then gives it as a gift to Frog. The next story is an atypical tale,
mostly because it doesn't end with a preachy moral (not that Lobel's
stories tend to, but this one was ripe for it). In it, Frog and Toad go
swimming. Frog prefers to swim au naturale but Toad has a fastidious
bathing suit that he is certain everyone will laugh at. After the two
swim Toad refuses to get out of the water until the crowd that has
gathered at the water's edge to see his suit disperse. They don't and
Toad reveals a suit that was probably in style in 1923. Even Frog
laughs too. Finally, in the last story Toad mentions to Frog that he is
unhappy because he never gets letters. Frog writes him one but delivers
it via their friend Snail (a character that in the play version of this
tale says that he, "Puts the go in escargot"). The two wait and long
before the snail arrives Frog tells Toad what is in the letter so that
the two are better friends for it. Three days later, Toad is happy to
receive his message.
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This is a story about the Alden kids, who visit their grandfather's
friend, Edward, who owns a zoo. Strange things happen at the zoo!!!!
There are 2 suspects. Helen Brook, who wants to close the zoo and Mac
Thatcher, who owns a book store. The Alden kids try to solve the
mystery of the zoo.
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Four-year-old Ramona is a HUGE burden in her sister's life. Nine and
shy, Beezus is always being forced to take Ramona along wherever she
goes, and finds herself constantly embarrassed by the active,
opinionated preschooler. It's hard for Beezus to have any life of her
own when she's got Ramona around to make trouble...crashing her
tricycle into the coffee table when Beezus and her friend Henry are
playing checkers, randomly announcing that she has invited her entire
preschool class over for a party, or inviting herself to Beezus' art
class and stealing all the spotlight. Beezus is almost ashamed to
admit it...she doesn't always love Ramona. But, as her mother and aunt,
help her see, that's all part of being sisters.
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Ms. Frizzles and the gang just want to study dinosaurs at the Museum of
Natural History. But by mistake, they end up traveling through time to
the actual Mesozoic era and come face to face with real meat-eaters!
Yikes! They learn about the differences between all kinds of dinosaurs
and the different eras these creatures roamed to earth. Don't miss
their exciting chase with a T-Rex and their race to get back home! Read
how the Magic School bus kids become real Dinosaur Detectives.
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The story takes place mostly in Terabithia, but they go to school and
other places too. Terabithia is a magical place that Jess and Leslie
make up. Jess and Leslie are the main characters. Jess is a very
excellent student. He is kind of a scaredy-cat but he never shows it to
Leslie. He is the kid who always wants to win. Jess is the king of
Terabithia. He even has a crush on his music teacher Miss Edmunds!
Leslie also is a marvelous student. She is a tip-top runner. Leslie is
the queen in Terabithia. She is also a very good story teller. In
Bridge to Terabithia Jess and Leslie don't really fit in. Jess lives at
home with his mom, dad, and 3 sisters. He has basically your average
kid's life. Now Leslie on the other hand lives with her mom and dad and
doesn't even have a TV!
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The six Herdmans are back in this hilarious sequel of Best Christmas
Pageant ever. The main characters, Beth Bradley (the narrator) and
Imogene Herdman (second oldest Herdman) are both in sixth grade. The
class is given a yearlong assignment "compliments for classmates" and
Beth begins to worry immediately. How can she possibly compliment the
second-meanest girl she knows (Gladys is meaner)?
Each chapter is about a little "crime" the Herdmans do this school
year, and those "crimes", oddly enough, help Beth to understand that
there is far more in Imogene than meanness and mischief, she is in fact
very intelligent and probably has a very loving heart underneath her
tough-girl attitude. Readers learn that there's good in everyone, even
in bullies.
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Ira has a dilemma - she is thrilled to be invited over to Reggie's
house for her very first sleep over, but her older sister has got her
really thinking. At home Ira sleeps with a teddy bear named Tah Tah.
She's never slept without him. But what would Reggie think if he knew
Ira slept with a teddy bear? What would Reggie say if he learned the
bear's name is Tah Tah? "Suppose Ira doesn't like sleeping without her
teddy bear. Suppose he absolutely hates sleeping without his teddy
bear. Should he take his teddy bear with him? Will Reggie laugh at
him?"
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All the animals are running scared when a thunderstorm strikes the
barnyard in Denys Cazet's Minnie and Moo Meet Frankenswine. The two
courageous cows unmask the mystery of a reputed monster on the
premises.
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Danny and Walter Budwing discover an oblong box in the park. Walter
dismisses the box as "just some dumb old game," but his curious younger
brother takes it home anyway. While Walter watches TV, Danny glances at
the game's "jungle adventure" board, then turns his attention to a
second board with an outer-space theme and "a path of colored squares
leading... to a purple planet called Zathura." Just then, "with a
click, a small green card pops out of the edge.... He picks it up and
reads, `Meteor showers, take evasive action.' " The boys don't act too
surprised when a giant meteor falls into their tastefully appointed
living room, but they do get excited when they see only stars and dark
sky outside their windows. Several dice-rolls later, they're scrambling
to evade a homicidal robot and a scaly "Zyborg pirate" climbing
backward through the meteor-hole in the ceiling (its face goes unseen).
As the boys play, their sibling rivalry gives way to cooperation, and
grouchy Walter comes to appreciate his little brother.
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Peter and Judy have been left home alone by their opera going parents
and boy are they boredy bored bored. After playing with their toys and
making a mess they decide to take a run to the park. Once there, they
discover an abandoned board game called Jumanji sitting beneath a tree.
On a note taped to the bottom of the box read the words, "Free game,
fun for some but not for all. P.S. Read instructions carefully". The
kids don't know what to expect but they take the game with them anyway.
After reading the instructions they find that once a person begins
Jumanji they cannot stop until someone has won the game. The first roll
of the die leads to a space that reads, "Lion attacks, move back two
spaces". Suddenly there's a real live lion in the room, and it's
regarding Peter hungrily. The kids realize, to their horror, that
whatever happens on the board happens in real life. If they want to
finish the game (and remain alive) they're going to have to continue.
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Hi, I'm Dorothy Ann, one of the kids in Ms. Frizzle's class. When we
started learning about volcanoes, I thought we'd just be studying them
in books -- but Ms. Frizzle had other ideas. She took us all the way to
Hawaii, where we waded through lava and saw a real volcano blow its
top. We had a great time -- even though the trip was sometimes almost
too hot to handle! One thing's for sure: This was one explosive
adventure that none of us will ever forget!
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Song Lee, his Korean-American classmate, is determined to promote
reconciliation between Harry and his nemesis, Tattletale Sidney.
Everyone (except Sidney) is anxious because Harry has to earn one more
ant sticker in order to join them on a field trip to a pond later in
the week. Sidney works hard to sabotage Harry's chances but Song Lee
leads the way to keep Harry on the roster. A master of mediation, she
is also willing to partner Sidney on the bus trip. Once at the pond,
Harry falls in, and the class and readers share the feeling that it
serves him right since he is seeking revenge against Sidney. Again,
Song Lee saves the day.
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This 4-chapter book by Suzy Kline is about Harry who is full of
horrible ideas. Chapter 1 is about secret pals each student in the
class picked for learning about writing and new friendship. At the end
Harry learned true friendship. The next chapter is about Harry leading
the group in a skit showing the danger of smoking. In Chapter 3 Harry
and the class, after reading Charlotte's Web, put cobwebs in the
principal's office and all over the school. In the final chapter Harry
demonstrated to others how to make green slime. Sydney spiked the
principal's hair!
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Herbie Jones gets two surprises on his first day of second grade. One
is meeting a new friend, Raymond Martin, on the way to school. The
second is learning that the new teacher they have is Mr.
Schnellenberger, not Mrs. (and Ray wants to call him Mr. Burger). Mr. S
has lots of fun plans for his class to sail through second grade. And
even though Ray is nervous about reading and Herbie about spelling,
they are pretty sure this will be a fun trip because they can go on it
together.
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When, in second grade, Leigh writes to an author to tell him how much
he "licked" his book, he never suspects that he'll still be writing to
him four years later. And he never imagines the kinds of things he'll
be writing about:
Dear Mr. Henshaw, I am sorry I was rude in my last letter... Maybe I
was mad about other things, like Dad forgetting to send this month's
support payment. Mom tried to phone him at the trailer park where, as
Mom says, he hangs his hat. It's not easy being the new kid in town,
with recently divorced parents, no dog anymore, and a lunch that gets
stolen every day (all the "good stuff," anyway). Writing letters, first
to the real Mr. Henshaw, and then in a diary to a pretend Mr. Henshaw,
may be just what he needs.
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This story is about a girl named Fern Arable, who is an ordinary farm
girl. Then one day her father sow had piglets. Soon her father realized
that one of them was a runt and decided that it needed to be killed.
Fern threw a fit and her father let her keep it as a pet. She went on
to name it Wilbur. The pig lived with her until he was five weeks old.
Then her father sold it to the Zukerman family. The pig grew to be
sadder and sadder every day because of his broken heart. Then Darkness
settled over everything. Soon there were only shadows and the noise of
the sheep chewing their cuds, and occasionally the rattle of a
cow-chain up overhead. You can only imagine Wilbur's surprise when, out
of the darkness, came a small voice he had never heard before. It
sounded rather thin, but pleasant. "Do you want a friend Wilbur?" it
said, "I'll be a friend to you. I've watched you all day and I like
you." Charlotte and Wilbur became very good friends. They even went on
to attend the county fair with each other were everyone loved Wilbur.
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Because of Winn-Dixie, a big, ugly, happy dog, 10-year-old Opal learns
10 things about her long-gone mother from her preacher father. Because
of Winn-Dixie, Opal makes new friends among the somewhat unusual
residents of her new hometown, Naomi, Florida. Because of Winn-Dixie,
Opal begins to find her place in the world and let go of some of the
sadness left by her mother's abandonment seven years earlier.
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When Froggy hears about an upcoming marching band contest, he wastes no
time in digging out his dad's old saxophone from the attic. Soon, along
with his recorder-tooting, triangle-tinging, baton-flinging pals,
Froggy has himself a bona fide marching band. As long as they can
remember the rules--"Don't look left. Don't look right. And DON'T STOP
FOR ANYTHING!"--they might even win the big prize. Of course, it's hard
to take everything into account...
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This story is about Little Gopher who was sad because `he couldn't keep
up with the other boys who were always riding, running, shooting their
bows, and wrestling to prove their strength.' Luckily for him he had
his own special talent, a talent for painting and creating.
When Little Gopher went out into the hills to think about becoming a
man, he had a dream vision. This vision told him to find a white
buckskin and to `keep it and one day you will paint a picture that is
as pure as the colors in the evening sky.'
Little Gopher got the white buckskin soon after, but didn't have the
right paints to paint the sunset. He kept trying to achieve the right
colors. Every morning he mixed paints in hopes that these ones wouldn't
be dull and flat like the others, but to no avail.
One night a voice told him to go up on top of a hill next evening at
sunset, `Because you have been faithful to the People and to your true
gift, you shall find the colors you are seeking.' Little Gopher went to
the hill the next evening and, lo and behold, there are brushes full of
paint the color of the sunset waiting there for him to paint his
masterpiece.
Little Gopher painted his masterpiece and when he got done he walked
back to his tent, leaving the brushes strewn across the hillside. In
the morning the brushes had multiplied and turned into flowers, and
little Gopher became known as He-Who-Brought-the-Sunset-to-the-Earth.
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When poor James Henry Trotter loses his parents in a horrible
rhinoceros accident, he is forced to live with his two wicked aunts,
Aunt Sponge and Aunt Spiker. After three years he becomes "the saddest
and loneliest boy you could find." Then one day, a wizened old man in a
dark-green suit gives James a bag of magic crystals that promise to
reverse his misery forever. When James accidentally spills the crystals
on his aunts' withered peach tree, he sets the adventure in motion.
From the old tree a single peach grows, and grows, and grows some more,
until finally James climbs inside the giant fruit and rolls away from
his despicable aunts to a whole new life. James befriends an assortment
of hilarious characters, including Grasshopper, Earthworm, Miss Spider,
and Centipede--each with his or her own song to sing.
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The Littles Go Exploring is a story about a family of very small
people called the Littles and their adventures. Their names are Tom,
Lucy, Baby Betsy, Granny, Uncle Pete and Uncle Nick. The Littles are
tiny people with tails. They lived secretly inside the walls of the
house owned by George W. Big and his family. No big people have ever
seen a Little or any other tiny families that lived in the houses in
the big valley. They keep in touch by letters that are delivered by
cousin Dinky and wife Della in his glider.
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Charlie and the Chocolate Factory by Roald Dahl is a great fantasy
book. It is about a boy named Charlie who wants to find one the five
golden tickets in a Wonka Bar. Charlie walks past Willy Wonka's
Chocolate Factory every day he walks to school. He stops and smells the
delicious chocolate every day. One day Charlie walks back from school
and sees something green in the snow. He looks closely it was a dollar!
So he picks it up and goes to the nearest candy shop and buys a Wonka
bar. He eats it all in one bite. Then he buys another bar and eats in
one bite again. Then he looks closer at what is it. It was the golden
ticket! So the store clerk yells and says this kid found the last
golden ticket! When Charlie gets home he tells his family he found the
last Golden Ticket. His grandpa who has not been out of bed for 20
years jumps out of bed and says I'll go. The next day Charlie and His
Grandpa Joe go to the factory. There are four other children there
waiting to go in. Mr. Wonka comes out and gets the children. Then they
start the tour. Mr. Wonka says everyone will get a life time of
chocolate and one will win the grand prize.
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Summer is over, but second-grader Ben doesn't want to go back to
school. He keeps thinking about all the terrible things that could
happen to him, like no one remembering him, or forgetting when to get
off the bus. But, happily, things don't turn out as Ben fears in this
reassuring antidote to the back-to-school blues.
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Strega Nona (Italian for "Grandma Witch") warns foolish Big Anthony
never to touch her pasta pot. One day, Big Anthony sees Strega Nona
sing to it, and the pot magically fills with spaghetti. What Anthony
doesn't see is the three kisses Strega Nona blows to make the pot stop.
Left alone for the day, Big Anthony excitedly uses the pot to feed the
whole town, but is helpless when pasta flows everywhere. Strega Nona
returns, stops the pot-and punishes Big Anthony by handing him a fork!
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Ramona Quimby, a brave and fearless (spunky according to her Dad)
little girl is just starting first grade. This year Ramona will need
all her spunk to deal with her first grade teacher who calls her Ramona
Kitty Cat (because Ramona prints the Q that starts her last name with
whiskers and ears), a bossy big sister, and her Mom's new job. But it
is hard to be brave when you take a different route to school and lose
your shoe protecting yourself from a growling German shepherd! Or when
you go to sleep in your new bedroom and, for the first time ever, you
are alone in the dark. Who knows what might be hiding under the bed,
slithering behind the curtains, or slinking around the walls?
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Molly wants to go back to Russia . The girls in her third-grade class
make fun of Molly's imperfect English and her peasant-looking clothes.
Her mother reminds her they can't go back to Russia ; the reason they
came to America was to escape religious persecution, and it would be
very dangerous to return. To make matters worse, Molly's teacher gives
the class a project for Thanksgiving. Not only has Molly never heard of
Thanksgiving, but she is supposed to make a Pilgrim doll out of a
clothespin for the class display. That evening, her mother offers to
help, and when Molly takes her doll to school the next day, the
children tease her, saying her doll doesn't look like a Pilgrim. But
Molly defends her position, explaining why the doll her mother made is
a pilgrim. With the help of the teacher, the entire class soon realizes
that not only is Molly right, but it really does take "all kinds of
Pilgrims to make a Thanksgiving".
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