Seedfolks by Paul Fleischman

            This book is a representation of all races, ethnicities, and religions coming together for a common goal. It promotes equality among people of different background that I feel is an important trait to instill in middle school students. The novel is a quick read, a factor that appeals to most middle school students; however, it contains several important and impactful messages about family, tolerance, community and life. The novel’s structure in having each new chapter come from a different character’s perspective contributes to this theme of community but it also introduces and shows students to the different ways that a novel can be written.

Summary courtesy of  http://www.edb.utexas.edu/resources/booksR4teens/book_reviews/book_reviews.php?book_id=96

Fleischman, Paul. (1997). Seedfolks. New York: Joanna Cotler Books. 102 pp. ISBN: 0-06-447297-8.

Seedfolks is a carefully crafted, elegantly written novel about a community garden that springs up on a trash-laden, rat-infested vacant lot. Each of the thirteen chapters is devoted to a particular character and his/her situation. We learn about the changes in the garden as seen through their eyes. As the book progresses, each person weaves themselves into the garden's life-- making improvements, getting to know others, sharing their time. The volunteers interaction has a carry-over effect outside the garden; they begin to know other's names and become real people to one another. At the end they have a "Harvest Celebration". They are celebrating more than a bunch of plants--they have become part of each other's lives. Fleischman, in sixty nine pages, created a tightly-written novel.  Even though it's a quick read, the story stays with you long after you have put the book down.  Fleischman creates amazingly realistic characters that speak to universal audiences and make his novel a delight to read.

The Devil's Arithmetic by Jane Yolen

This is a wonderful book to have middle school students read when studying the Holocaust. I had the chance to watch the movie in eighth grade when my class studied the Holocaust. I also learned that a teacher at Oakland shows the movie following the class reading of Maus: A Survivor's Tale. The book provides a more in-depth look at Jewish customs, religious practices, and the Yiddish language than the movie. This story also integrates modern with the past by having the main character from the 20th century experience the horrors of the Holocaust in the 1940s. Essentially as teachers, we want the students to have that similar type of experience so they can understand the Holocaust and I feel that this text is able to provide that.

Summary Courtesy of http://www.shvoong.com/books/259906-devil-arithmetic/

The Devil's Arithmetic is a heartbreaking story about the Holocaust that really helps you relate to the horror that the Jewish people and many others went through at that awful time. It is about a Jewish girl named Hannah that cannot appreciate her religion and the life she has. She finds herself back in the 1940's after she opens a door to the past, her and her relatives enduring the torture of the Nazis. Aristotle once said, "Evil draws men together." In the Holocaust, as the Nazi's cruelty pulled the Germans and Jews apart, it drew the Jewish people together. The Devil's Arithmetic is factual and emotionally wrenching as it shows you how things worked in death camps. Hannah, the main character, is in denial in the beginning, but starts to get lost in her new self and lose her old memory as well. She is wise beyond her years, an old wisewoman trapped in a young girl's body. Hannah becomes selfless, and then makes the largest sacrifice possible for a young girl she hardly knows.

Yolen, Jane. (1990). Devil’s Arithmetic. New York: Puffin Books. 176 pp. ISBN: 0-14-034535-3.

Choosing Up Sides by John H. Ritter

The novel introduces students to themes of standing up for what is right even if it means going against familial expectations and authority. Like the protagonist Luke in the novel, middle school students are struggling with their identity and finding out who they really are. Students will be able to relate to Luke on that level. The element of strict, oppressive religion is also included in this novel. There is a tendency when thinking about religious intolerance to view it as those outside the religion being intolerant of those practicing faith. In the case of this novel, the reader gets the opposite perspective of a man of religion being intolerant of those outside or against his beliefs. I feel it is important for students to see this different, often unseen perspective.

Summary Courtesy of http://www.flipkart.com/choosing-up-sides-john-ritter-book-0613284445

13-year-old Luke Bledsoe is a left-hander in a right-handed world. Moved from town to town, he's spent his life feeling like an outsider. Then, by chance, he steps on a baseball field and discovers he can pitch. But Luke's father, Reverend Bledsoe, believes that the left side is the side of Satan, and the baseball field is the Devil's playground. Luke has spent his whole life trying to please his father. Will he choose to give up the game he's come to love -- or turn his back on his family?

Ritter, John H. (1998). Choosing Up Sides. New York: Puffin Books. 166 pp. ISBN: 0-698-11840-5.

Daniel's Story by Carol Matas

This novel offers students a fictional, first-person account of the Holocaust. It spans the Jewish journey from ghettos to concentration camps to extermination camps. Its historical accuracy compounded with the main character Daniel’s personal experiences and growth makes for an informative and interesting read. Some of Daniel’s changes, emotions, and relationships are ones that middle school students can relate to. It is important for students to learn the history of the Holocaust but this book allows for them to relate to it on a personal level.

Summary Courtesy of http://www.enotes.com/daniels-story-qn

Daniel's Story is the tale of the horrific odyssey of a Jewish family, an odyssey which begins in Frankfurt, Germany in 1933 and concludes in Lodz, Poland in 1945. The narrator, Daniel, both a German and a Jew, is but six years of age when his family's story begins, and he is a very weary eighteen when it concludes. Through Daniel's eyes, readers experience the rising anti-semitism in Germany, a growing hatred which culminates in the Nazis' establishment and gruesome use of the death camps.

Matas, Carol. (1993). Daniel’s Story. New York: Scholastic Paperbacks. 144 pp. ISBN: 0-59-0465885.

First They Killed My Father by Loung Ung

This novel offers students a look at the genocide that took place in Cambodia. Unlike the Holocaust, the genocide in Cambodia is not as well known by middle school students. This gives the students a chance to learn about other genocides that have gone in the world’s history. It can also be used to introduce students to the memoir genre.

Summary Courtesy of http://www.harpercollins.com/author/authorExtra.aspx?isbn13=9780060856267&displayType=readingGuide

First They Killed My Father is a heart-wrenching and often difficult historical autobiography that recounts the brutality of war with vivid detail. A story of political oppression in Cambodia, it is all the more striking and intense as it is told from the perspective of a child, one who is thrust into situations that she doesn't understand, as she is only five years old when the terror begins. Loung Ung made many difficult journeys during her Cambodian youth, starting with being evacuated from her hometown of Phnom Penh. More meaningful were the journeys of self, which led her from a life as the child of a large and privileged family to that of an orphan and work camp laborer. From the deaths of her parents and sisters, we get a glimpse of the power that family relationships have in our lives. From the loss of economic status, the ways in which our social class can define our days is drawn in sharper relief. From her growing knowledge of the regime that has caused her to suffer, we learn of the vast gulf that often exists between a government's intentions and its actions, between words and deeds.

Ung, Loung. (2000). First They Killed My Father. New York: HarperCollins Publishers. 238 pp. ISBN: 0-06-093138-8.