I was bullied as a child, both at home and in school. My parents always took my little sister’s side, and punished me. When I got bullied at school, my parents and teachers just told me to work harder on throwing a ball. My escape was books. I found it reassuring that kids in books who got bullied survived and learned and had fun in their lives even if they also had to deal with bullying.
Grandma knits Lila a poncho. This poncho has not one, but three, head holes in it! Lila is sure Grandma made a mistake. Grandma sends her out to play, saying, “We all pull together!” Lila thinks that makes no sense. Or maybe it refers to knitting. While she is out playing, she encounters three kids who need her help, including the neighborhood bully. Who will she help? And what does the poncho have to do with it?
Asking a kind person to do a good deed isn’t usually considered bullying. But there is such a thing as taking advantage of kindness.
Mayzie, the lazy bird, convinces Horton to sit on her egg while she takes a vacation. She promises to be back soon, but doesn’t keep her word. Soon all the other animals tease Horton for sitting on that egg. But Horton sits on that egg, through rain, snow, and heat. He even keeps his word when hunters capture him and take him, egg, nest, tree, and all to America and sell him to a circus.
Mayzie only shows up when her baby is hatching. Suess comes up with a happy ending.
Horton the elephant babysits an egg in this classic tale of kindness from Dr. Seuss.
Everyone laughs when Horton the Elephant offers to sit on Mayzie bird's egg while she goes on holiday. Horton's kindness and faithfulness are sorely tested when he, and the egg, are kidnapped and sold to a circus - but his reward for being faithful is more wonderful than he could ever have dreamed!
With his unique combination of hilarious stories, zany pictures and riotous rhymes, Dr. Seuss has been delighting young children and helping them learn to read for over fifty years. Creator of the…
Jeremy moves into town, just down the block from the narrator of this charming tale.
A boy meets his first enemy. Jeremy is popular. He teases and insults the narrator. He invites all the kids except the narrator to a party at his house where everyone jumps on a trampoline. Our narrator asks his dad for help. Dad says he has had enemies and he knows what to do – he has a secret recipe for Enemy Pie.
While Dad makes this pie, he says it is important to keep the enemy distracted. He tells our narrator to be nice to Jeremy. He must keep Jeremy out of the kitchen while the pie is being made. Then when the pie is ready, it’s time to invite Jeremy for dinner, where he will eat Enemy Pie.
By the time the pie is ready our narrator has become friends with Jeremy and doesn’t want him to eat the pie. But Dad insists, and even eats some himself. This is an encouraging and humorous tale of dealing with an enemy.
It was the perfect summer. That is, until Jeremy Ross moved into the house down the street and became neighborhood enemy number one. Luckily Dad had a surefire way to get rid of enemies: Enemy Pie. But part of the secret recipe is spending an entire day playing with the enemy!
In this funny yet endearing story, one little boy learns an effective recipes for turning your best enemy into your best friend. Accompanied by charming illustrations, Enemy Pie serves up a sweet lesson in the difficulties and ultimate rewards of making new friends.
Nico is a nature lover. At recess, he doesn’t always want to swing on the swings. Sometimes he wants to sit and watch ants carrying seeds to their anthills.
One day birds come up to him. He enjoys the birds. The other kids call him “bird boy.” He knows they are teasing him. He knows they are being mean. But he thinks about what the words mean. And he surprises himself by smiling.
After that, he not only watches birds, he pretends to be different birds. A few other children become fascinated by his imagination. They like him for who he is. Birds and all.
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Bird Boy
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This book is for kids age
4,
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7.
What is this book about?
Take flight in this heartwarming story about a boy who learns to be true to himself at school while following his love of nature.
Nico was new, and nervous about going to school. Everyone knew what to do and where to go, but Nico felt a little lost.
So, he did what he loved to do: Watched the insects Sat in the grass And most importantly... befriended the birds.
Before he knew it, Nico was known as BIRD BOY. But Nico didn't mind. Soon, he made one friend, then two, as the other kids learned to appreciate Nico for who…
Dragon was terrible. In fact, he was super terrible. He was rude and noisy and took things from babies.
The king offered a prize to the knight who could tame this terrible dragon. The knights all battled the dragon. None of them could tame him. Then all the people of the kingdom decided that they had had enough of this terrible dragon.
They offered the king’s prize to anyone (didn’t have to be a knight) who could tame this dragon. Lots of people tried to defeat the dragon in battle. They all failed. Then a boy gets a different idea. He writes a story and reads it to the dragon.
This story and this approach are so different from what everybody else has tried that the dragon – oh – I’m not going to tell you what the dragon does – read this – it’s good!
We all know dragons are terrible, but this one is especially terrible. He scribbles in books. He steals candy from baby unicorns. He even burps in church. Seriously, who does that? Dragon, that's who. The king, the knights, and the villagers are desperate to take down this beast once and for all. But sometimes it's up to the unlikeliest of heroes to tame a dragon this terrible.
On the first day of school, no one can pronounce a little girl’s name. It gets stuck in the teacher’s throat. The other students cough trying to say it. The girl goes home determined never to go to school again.
Her mom teaches her to sing names. Some names have fire. Some must be sung from the heart or the belly. The next day at school, the teacher has no trouble with any of the other students’ names, but still can’t pronounce the girl’s. The girl sings her name. The teacher is confused, and says “Names aren’t songs.”
The girl sings the teacher’s name. The teacher gets it. Soon some of the other students want her to sing their names. What started out as bullying – trying to make the girl feel bad about her unusual name becomes a bonding and learning opportunity. The basic viewpoint here is good for many types of bullying: Hang in there. The other kids are being mean because they don’t understand. Help them learn.
Frustrated by a day full of teachers and classmates mispronouncing her beautiful name, a little girl tells her mother she never wants to come back to school. In response, the girl's mother teaches her about the musicality of African, Asian, Black-American, Latinx, and Middle Eastern names on their lyrical walk home through the city. Empowered by this newfound understanding, the young girl is ready to return the next day to share her knowledge with her class. Your Name is a Song is a celebration to remind all of us about the beauty, history, and magic behind names.
My book recommendations reflect an abiding passion for Japanese literature, which has unquestionably influenced my own writing. My latest literary interest involves Japanese poetry—I’ve recently started a project that combines haiku and prose narration to describe my experiences as a part-time resident in a 1300-year-old Japanese hot spring town that Bashō helped make famous in The Narrow Road to the Deep North. But as a writer, my main focus remains novels. In late 2023 the second in a planned series of novels set in Ishikawa prefecture will be published. I currently live in Kanazawa, but have also been lucky to call Sapporo, Akita, Tokyo, and Fukui home at different times.
Emmitt’s plans collapse when his wife, Mirai, suddenly backs out of purchasing their dream home. Disappointed, he’s surprised to discover her subtle pursuit of a life and career in Tokyo.
In his search for a meaningful life in Japan, and after quitting his job, he finds himself helping his mother-in-law translate Kanazawa’s most famous author, Izumi Kyoka, into English. He becomes drawn into the mysterious death of a friend of Mirai’s parents, leading him and his father-in-law to climb the mountain where the man died. There, he learns the somber truth and discovers what the future holds for him and his wife.
Packed with subtle literary allusion and closely observed nuance, Kanazawa reflects the mood of Japanese fiction in a fresh, modern incarnation.
In Kanazawa, the first literary novel in English to be set in this storied Japanese city, Emmitt's future plans collapse when his wife, Mirai, suddenly backs out of negotiations to purchase their dream home. Disappointed, he's surprised to discover Mirai's subtle pursuit of a life and career in Tokyo, a city he dislikes.
Harmony is further disrupted when Emmitt's search for a more meaningful life in Japan leads him to quit an unsatisfying job at a local university. In the fallout, he finds himself helping his mother-in-law translate Kanazawa's most famous author, Izumi Kyoka, into English.
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