It's Monday! What are you reading?

 

It's Monday! What are you Reading? is a meme hosted by Kathryn at Book Date. It's a great way to recap what you read and/or reviewed the previous week and to plan out your reading and reviews for the upcoming week. It's also a great chance to see what others are reading right now...you just might discover your next “must-read” book!

Kellee Moye, of Unleashing Readers, and Jen Vincent, of Teach Mentor Texts decided to give It's Monday! What Are You Reading? a kidlit focus. If you read and review books in children's literature - picture books, chapter books, middle grade novels, young adult novels, anything in the world of kidlit - join us! We love this meme and think you will, too. We encourage everyone who participates to visit at least three of the other kidlit book bloggers that link up and leave comments for them.

If you want to know more about what I've been reading, visit my Goodreads shelf.

Past Week on the Blog:

Celebrate!

 Rich in Color - Love, Hate & Other Filters

Past Week in Books: 

Good Night Stories for Rebel Girls is a nice collection of art & mini-bios of some amazing women. I like that you get a wide range of women. It's great for brief introductions of these women, but because of the format, obviously much is left out. I think it's a good starting place for learning about the women & then moving on to more comprehensive information elsewhere.

Everything I Never Told You is an interesting look at how people know and don't know each other. A family is working through the aftermath of a death and seeing how sometimes our communication or lack of it, can lead us to misperceptions of each other. The family realizes that we may think we know someone, but how we see someone is greatly affected by who we are. How we see someone can show more about us than them sometimes. (This was on my MustReadin2018 list)

I Like, I Don't Like shares pictures & comments where a child in one place and/or situation can like something and a child in another can dislike it. An example is a child playing with Lego bricks and a statement of liking bricks across from a picture of a child making bricks saying they don't like bricks. The focus is poverty and child labor around the world. The book ends with a few paragraphs describing the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child. This is a book that would need to be accompanied by quite a bit of support & discussion. I feel it is a bit heavy handed or teachy because they kept it very simple, but does open up room for important conversations.

Vincent and Theo had me ugly crying. The sibling relationship revealed in this book is so powerful. I was in awe of the love they had for each other. The story doesn't not have a happy ending as most would likely know before reading. Even knowing that, I was unprepared for the amount of emotion I felt. This is an incredible book.

Mulan was a simple and straightforward re-telling of the Ballad of Mulan. I really enjoy hearing about women who have done great things.

It's Shoe Time! is an Elephant & Piggie Presents book and is quite adorable.

Amira's Totally Chocolate World is a cute story of a girl who wants a chocolate world. On Eid ul-Fitr she wakes up to that reality, but understands that a fully chocolate world would make life difficult and is not something she truly wants.

Ugly Cat & Pablo is a cute and funny early chapter book that includes some Spanish. I'm eager to share it with students. I know they will find much to enjoy and laugh at in this one and it's short enough I can read it with my classes.

The Coming Week:

I'm re-reading Down and Across to write a review, but otherwise, I'm not sure what I will grab this week. Happy reading!
 

Reading Challenge Updates: 
Goodreads Challenge 2018 - 25/800
Diversity on the Shelf 2018 - 17/300
#MustReadin2018 - 2/30