reading

Fairy Tale Spin Offs

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grimms fairy tales

One of my students loaned me a book called The Land of Stories by Chris Colfer. You might recognize the author name as one of the Glee actors (yes, the TV show). The book sat on my nightstand for over a month before I finally picked it up. The student was starting to ask questions, and I was getting embarrassed. I judged the book by its cover– or rather the actor/author name and had pretty low expectations, but I needed to be able to make a few comments to my sweet student about the story. I was pleasantly surprised. It is a fun spin on the “ever after” of all of the best fairy tale characters.

Throw a library card, and you will hit a fairy tale spin off book. The books are everywhere right now, and I am hooked. Here is my suggested list. I have read only a few and most are on my “to read” list. Which one should I read next?

land of stories colfer

Upper Elementary

  • Dealing with Dragons by Patricia C. Wrede
  • Ella Enchanted by Gail Carson Levine
  • Fairest by Gail Carson Levine (Enchanted series)
  • The Fairy Tale Detectives by Michael Buckley (The Sisters Grimm series)
  • Happily Ever After by Anna Quindlen
  • The Land of Stories: The Wishing Spell by Chris Colfer
  • Rapunzel, The One With All the Hair by Wendy Mass (Twice Upon a Time series)
  • A Tale Dark and Grimm series by Adam Gidwitz
  • The Wide Awake Princess by E.D. Baker (and others by this author)

entwined by heather dixon

Middle School

  • Enchanted by Alethea Kontis (Woodcutter series, mixed reviews)
  • Entwined by Heather Dixon
  • The Goose Girl by Shannon Hale
  • The Grimm Legacy by Polly Shulman
  • The Princess Bride by William Goldman

red riding hood

And a picture book that I thought looked fun…

  • Honestly, Red Riding Hood was Rotten by Trisha Speed Shaskan (and others in this series)

Book Journals

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Last year, the school librarian where I work sent an e-mail to all parents suggesting we start a book journal with our kids. When our librarian’s son was in the first grade, she started recording every book title her son read in a basic black and white composition journal. Her son is now a 9th grader and is still adding to his book journal.

My niece started her book journal when she was in the 4th grade. When I visited last summer, I asked her if she had any new book recommendations for me. She could not think of any suggestions immediately, so she handed me her book journal. I paged through all of the titles dating back 4 years. When I would ask about specific titles, it immediately sparked discussion. Without her yearly lists, she would not have been able to recall nearly as much.

The book journal is a great tool for several reasons. To begin with, it shows how much your reading improves by looking at the book choices from year to year. My son moved from the Jigsaw Jones series (2nd grade range) to Henry Huggins (4th grade range) last year alone.

There is a sense of accomplishment when you see a list of completed books. It is fun to be able to announce that you read 49 books during the school year!

The list prompts memories of books you might have forgotten. It also shows if you followed one author or style of book during a certain period. If you need some new book choices, it is easy to return to the list to help jog your memory for author names or book series. What are other good ways to log book lists?

What To Do: List the grade level at the top of each new page. List the date the book is completed in the left column. List title then author name. In addition, you could add reading level, page count, a rating scale of some kind. Keep it simple so it is not a chore to complete.

 

Because I Just Can’t Read That Book One More Time

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There are many benefits to reading picture books and chapter books multiple (even hundreds) of times, but if you are the parent doing the reading, this can be a labor of love. A dear friend told me that if she reads Pinkalicious one more time, she may have to “set the book on fire” (original comment has been censored).

As repetitive as it can be for parents, it is a good thing to read a picture book so many times your kid can recite the words from memory. Children are absorbing the words into their “sight” word bank without realizing it. They are picking up word and sentence structure patterns like capitalization at the beginning of a sentence and punctuation at the end of a sentence. They are learning to follow the story from left to right and top to bottom. I am not recommending you force yourself to suffer through the same book beyond your breaking point, but I am recommending you read aloud often with your children (and that may include a re-run or two… or ten).

Reading aloud to your child models good reading techniques and helps with fluency. It gives you time to stop and talk about what is happening, so you can informally check listening skills and improve your child’s comprehension. Picture books are short, so it is easy to complete a whole story in one sitting. Picture books for older readers have a lot of depth and require some critical thought, so you can keep reading these books all the way through elementary school; there are many I use for lessons with my 4th grade students. Lastly, it is enjoyable and relaxing and how often do you get that kind of time with your child?

The picture books on the list below pass my can-be-read-10-days-in-a-row test. Help me out with additional read aloud suggestions that won’t get stale too quickly. The books below may be new to you, but they have been in high rotation at my house for awhile now.

Amazing Illustrations

  • King Bidgood’s in the Bathtub by Audrey Wood (or others by this author)
  • The Brambly Hedge series by Jill Barklem
  • Flotsam by David Wiesner (or others by this author)
  • The Three Snow Bears by Jan Brett (or others by this author)

Puzzle-y/Interactive

  • Who’s Hiding? by Satoru Onishi
  • Seven Blind Mice by Ed Young
  • What Do You Do With a Tail Like This? by Steve Jenkins and Robin Page
  • Who is Driving? by Leo Timmers
  • I Spy: An Alphabet in Art by Lucy Micklethwait
  • Press Here by Herve Tullet

Non-Fiction/Based on a True Story

  • Me…Jane by Patrick McDonnell
  • My Apron by Eric Carle (be sure to read the author note at the end)
  • One Giant Leap by Robert Burleigh
  • Two Bobbies by Kirby Larson and Mary Nethery
  • Emily by Michael Bedard

For a Laugh

  • Dear Deer: A Book of Homophones by Gene Barretta
  • Giggle, Giggle, Quack by Doreen Cronin (or others by this author)
  • A Fine, Fine School by Sharon Creech
  • Officer Buckle and Gloria by Peggy Rathmann

Other Picture Book Authors I Like

  • Mem Fox
  • Patricia Polacco
  • David Shannon
  • Mo Willems
  • Chris Van Allsburg

Perfectly Poetic

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My children are poets, and they don’t even know it. Their latest poetic accomplishment is re-writing lyrics to the Gotye “Somebody That I Used to Know” song. Their version is, “Somebody that I used to throw!” or “Somebody that I used to mow!” or any other rhyming word they can insert. When we go to our local Moe’s Southwest Grill, and the burrito makers call out, “Welcome to Moe’s!” my children chime in with, “I have big toes!” or “I need to blow my nose!” You can see how we are inspiring some real William Blakes over here.

Rhyming is a skill children begin early in life. It is one of the easiest ways to encourage a love of poetry because it is easy to read and repeat. And often, rhyming poems are silly (think Shel Silverstein and Dr. Seuss) and that is just plain fun.

The other game we have been known to play at our house is the name-as-many-words-as-you-can-think-of-that-begin-with-a-specific-letter-in-the-alphabet game. How many parents with nursery school aged children play this game? When it is “d” week at school, have you spent a car ride home from school calling out “dragon” and “dinner” and “dog”? You may not be aware, but you are increasing vocabulary, improving letter sound awareness, and introducing alliteration (repetition of letter sounds at the beginning of words).

If you have not been including poetry books or books with poetic language on your reading list, you are missing out. It allows for small chunks of reading; it reinforces all kinds of good reading skills like making inferences, and it enhances creative ways to use and combine words.

Picture Books: On a half day of school before a holiday, I will bring a stack of my children’s picture books to my classroom and put my students in teams. They receive a chart with headings of all of the figures of speech and poetry terms that we have learned (similes, metaphors, alliteration, onomatopoeia, personification, repetition…). The students must read through the picture books until they find examples and complete the chart.

  • Truck Duck and Dunk Skunk by Michael Rex (rhyming)
  • Click, Clack, Moo: Cows That Type and Giggle, Giggle, Quack by Doreen Cronin (onomatopoeia, personification)
  • Emily by by Michael Bedard and Barbara Cooney (combine with Emily Dickinson poems, metaphors)
  • Once Upon a Twice by Denise Doyen and Barry Moser (combine with e.e. cummings poems)
  • Brown Bear, Brown Bear, What Do You See? by Eric Carle (repetition)
  • Jamberry by Bruce Degen
  • Any Dr. Seuss

Short Stories: I ask students to write an epilogue to this short story. In their epilogue, they must include similes and metaphors that describe sunshine and rain in the same style Bradbury uses in his short story. Spoiler Alert– this story may make you cry.

  • All Summer in a Day by Ray Bradbury (figurative language all over the place)

Chapter Books: The Sharon Creech books, particularly Hate That Cat, are great ways to introduce all of the figures of speech. Incorporate the poems that the main character mentions as part of your reading. Creech includes copies of the poems at the back of the book. Write your own version of the “Love That Boy” poem by Walter Dean Myers. We wrote “Love That Book” poems.

  • Love That Dog and Hate That Cat by Sharon Creech
  • In the Year of the Boar and Jackie Robinson by Betty Bao Lord (similes)

Poetry Books

  • Where the Sidewalk Ends by Shel Silverstein
  • Joyful Noise by Paul Fleischman (poems for two voices)
  • For Laughing Out Loud by Jack Prelutsky
  • The Random House Book of Poetry for Children compiled by Jack Prelutsky
  • Sharing the Seasons compiled by Lee Bennett Hopkins

Poems

  • Fog by Carl Sandburg
  • Hope is the Thing with Feathers by Emily Dickinson
  • The Bells by Edgar Allan Poe
  • The Road Not Taken by Robert Frost
  • Galoshes by Rhonda Bacmeister
  • in Just by e.e. cummings