Title: Snow

Author: Marion Dane Bauer

Illustrator: John Wallace

Genre/Theme: Informational book

Grade Level Appropriateness: Preschool-First Grade

Characters: Dog, two children

Summary: In this story children and the dog explore the wonders of winter. The text explains cloud formation, snow crystal formation and size, as well as the snow’s place in the water cycle. The children wait for the snow with enthusiasm and then they have fun skating and sledding together.

Comments: The beautiful and charming watercolor pictures reflect the beauty of the season and the excitement and thrill children feel for the snow. The large text and simple sentence structure makes the book especially suitable for early readers. This short text is paced with huge number of information. I thing this book can be useful in the classroom for science lessons as well as for the easy reader shelf in the class library.

Title: Story of Ruby Bridges

Author: Robert Coles

Illustrator: George Ford

Genre/Theme: Autobiography/Biography

Grade Level Appropriateness: First Grade-Third Grade

Characters: Ruby Bridges, Ruby’s teacher, Ruby’s family

Summary: The book tells a true story about six year old girl who attended elementary school in New Orleans where all students were white. As the only African American student in this school Ruby had to face crowds of angry protestors every day on the way to school. Ruby bravely walked in each morning, escorted by federal marshals. The white parents pulled their children out of the school thus, for long time Ruby and the teacher were the only one in the classroom. Regardless of the amount of racism and discrimination she faced during this time, she did not give up and what’s more she prayed to God to forgive the protesters. Finally, by the time Ruby entered second grade the mob disappeared, and the rest of the students returned to school.

Comments: This is a moving story that captures well the courage, incredible strength and heroism of a little girl who was standing alone in the face of racism. It also clearly presents the turmoil of America in the early 1960s. Ruby became a part of our history that changed the country and she set an example that will be remembered for years to come.