Green Acres School

2011 Award Winners Are On The Shelves!

For those of you who can’t make it into our library to browse our new display of 2011 Award Winners, here is a virtual tour highlighting some of our favorite from the 2011 ALA Youth Media awards.

Ruth, Bevin, Quinby, and Pam

2011 John Newbery Winner Moon Over Manifest by Clare Vanderpool

Abilene Tucker finds herself on the train heading to Manifest, Kansas to the only place her father ever called home during the height of the depression. Once in Manifest, Abilene begins a summer of discovery to learn about her father and herself. With the help of her new friends, Abilene looks for clues as to the owner of the hidden cigar box filled with letters and other old keepsakes and the identity of a spy from WWI. The historical and vivid accounts of the war and depression provide a window for young readers into a modern life that is recognizable but so different from the digital world of today.

2011 Cadelcott Medal

A Sick Day For Amos McGee by Philip C. Stead

A great story about friendship and kindness. Amos McGee as zookeeper always visiting and plays with his animals in his zoo. When one day Amos is sick in bed with a cold, his animal friends visit him and keep him company while he is sick. The detail in the art work is amazing and the way the illustrator created the pages is a story unto itself.

2011 Coretta Scott King Winner

One Crazy Summer by Rita Williams-Garcia

The protagonist in this novel, set in 1968, is an extraordinary character — resourceful, wise, grounded, and responsible 11-year-old Delphine. Along with her two younger sisters, Delphine travels from her home in NYC to spend a month in Oakland, CA with their mother, who deserted them when the youngest child was an infant. Williams-Garcia puts her characters into wonderful and trying situations. The juxtaposition between the girls’ home life in Brooklyn with their traditional grandmother and father and their stay in Oakland with their avant-garde, poet/printer, more radical mother gives the book great depth. The summer camp and quasi-community center run by the Black Panthers is a very interesting addition that the author describes appropriately for children.

2011 Pura Belpre Award

The Dreamer by Pam Munoz Ryan

What a great book to use to introduce magical realism to students. The fictional story inspired by the real-life story of poet Pablo Neruda is accessible to children from early elementary through middle school.

Neftali, the main character, finds magic, color, and words everywhere. He is incapable of stopping himself despite his domineering father and as a result finds himself constantly trying to please his dad while always disappointing him because he doesn’t have the same dreams as his father. The story is the triumph of spirit over will of others and shows how one boy didn’t allow others to label him. An added bonus with this book is that Peter Sis illustrated it and did a fantastic job.

Other 2011 Winners Turtles In Paradise by Jennifer Holm

Jennifer Holm’s 20th century historical fiction stories are loaded with atmosphere. Paradise in this case is Key West of the 1930s. You often feel that you are walking down the street with Turtle and her relatives (everyone is related) during the Great Depression. With her mom forced to take a job as a housekeeper with a woman who doesn’t like kids, Turtle is shipped off to her aunt’s for safekeeping. The atmosphere is so rich that you have a real sense of what it was like growing up in pre-war FL (e.g., no air conditioning). With a couple of cameos by Hemingway, it is a fun and light read.

Dark Emperor by Joyce Sidman

Fantastic art and fantastic poetry. If you have a chance to read it and peruse the art work you won’t be disappointed. Terrific story about the night and the animals in the forest.

Ling & Ting: Not Exactly the Same by Grace Lin

This book contains delightful stories about two young twins who are “not exactly the same.” It is filled with humor and wisdom and is presented in a perfect format for beginning readers.

Dave The Potter by Laban Carrick Hill

Interrupting Chicken by David Ezra Stein

Ballet for Martha by Jan Greenberg