Family Book Club: Fish in a Tree

We recently finished reading Fish in a Tree by Lynda Mullaly Hunt for our Family Book Club. It's a cute book about a girl with a learning disability and how she finally gets help and starts to become more comfortable with who she is. I like that the problem is not just solved, and she never has to deal with it again (which can be a theme in middle grade fiction,) but that she has to be brave enough to ask for help and that it takes hard work to improve. And that the problem won't just go away but that she can learn tools to help her deal with it. That seems like a much more realistic message than just the "Happily Ever After" kind of stuff. Fish in a Tree is basically a mash up between Wonder and Because of Mr. Terupt actually. If I had to read only one of the three books I would choose Wonder in a heartbeat, but Fish in a Tree is a close second. The book has themes of friendship, bullying, learning disabilities, courage, and perseverance to name a few.

We started off by talking a little about the author and reading her note she has in the back of the book for her readers. It's a great testimonial about how important it is to keep trying. That you are only a failure if you give up. Apparently the author had a learning disability and yet was able to grow up to be a successful teacher and author because of the help she received from that one special teacher (like Mr. Daniels in the book.)

I made a Word Scramble using words from the book to show how difficult it would be to read if the words weren't in order like someone with Dyslexia might experience. We also watched a very short Youtube clip about Dyslexia.

Fish in a Tree was a book chosen for a nationwide readathon last year so there were lots of great Kahoots already made up for it. Kahoot is basically a trivia game that you can play online using just about any electronic device. Other teachers had already made the Kahoot (the quiz) and we just joined the game and played a few. It's a fun way to review and see how much you remember. In the past I have created my own Kahoots but it's a lot easier to use one that's already made!

Then we had a Sundae Bar. In the book Ally's mom works at A.C. Peterson's as a waitress and there are several mentions of having Sundaes there. We could have also done cupcakes because Ally's friend Keisha likes to bake them, but I opted for the ice cream instead.

After that I thought we were done, but a few of the kids wanted to draw a picture like Ally does in the book. She has a Sketchbook of Impossible things that she draws in, mostly when she's frustrated. So the kids drew their own impossible things. Garrett's was a Snowman suntanning on a raft in the pool. Drake's was a collection of things: Spiderman falling off a building, Pacman coming out of the game console to chase people, Gozilla attacking the city...etc, etc. Lexi started one but I haven't seen the finished product. She was doing one where a turtle moves out of it's shell to go off to college. Zac wasn't interested in doing the picture, which was fine because it was just an impromptu bonus. It made me feel good that the kids wanted to continue with book club and do their own activity.

Once again it was a fun, successful book club night. Now we are getting a little more serious and reading Shooting Kabul which is about the Taliban and Afghanistan but written for the 8-12 age range. I just think the kids should have a better understanding of what is going on in other parts of the world. We've been reading a lot of books that seem pretty similar so I wanted to change up the tone and do something new.

Memorable Moment: Drake and Garrett spent quite a bit of time yesterday building this really cool jet with their K'nex pieces. I thought it was really impressive so I had to add it to the blog somehow!