Illegal by Eoin Colfer

No human being is illegal.

Ebo: alone. His sister left months ago. Now his brother has disappeared too. And Ebo knows it can only be to make the hazardous journey to Europe. Ebo's epic journey takes him across the Sahara desert to the dangerous streets of Tripoli, and finally out to the merciless sea. But with every step he holds on to his hope for a new life.

Illegal illustrates the terrifying journey of twelve year old Ebo who is chasing his brother in hope of being reunited with their sister. Told through both present time and flashbacks, it shows the start of Ebo's journey nineteen months before when he manages to avoid bus fare by singing a baby to sleep. Himself and his brothers face terrifying danger throughout their perilous journey from small boats leaking to larger boats capsizing.

Illegal is a heart breaking story with stunning illustrations that have a huge effect and are desperately poignant at times. It humanises events that are so often seen on the news and would be great to share with children about a topic so often overlooked.

Many innocents die as a result, their loss of life often unknown and unrecorded. In 2015, more than a million migrants crossed the Mediterranean Sea to enter Europe. The United Nations has described the situation as a "colossal humanitarian catastrophe" and it is still going on.

 

Toppsta review by 2AP: The Lost Penguin

The Lost Penguin is about a penguin that runs away from the zoo. Oliver and Ruby are friends but fight a lot when they are trying to find the penguin. They both want to keep Patch for them self! We loved this book because it is all about friends and we love our friends.

It reminded us of a book that our christmas elf gave us. It was called Penguin by Polly Dunbar. If you like The Lost Penguin then you would really like that.

This story would be great for children in Year 1. It has nice and bright pictures and the story is easy for them to understand. We are going to share the book with our friends in Year 1 now.

Thank you Toppsta for letting us review one of your books. We loved doing this review and talking about the book together. We hope we can do some more soon!

By Hajra, Mawia, Aliza, Kareena and Oliwia

Weekly reads in 2AP

As an adult who loves books, I'm thrilled that my year 2 class love books just as much. They will happily read independently, with a peer, on Active Learn during golden time or listen intently to our class book. The children love to share books they have read with the rest of the class and are brilliant at making links between different books we have read. They also absolutely love the interaction they can have with authors on twitter.

Like every class in the country our timetable is busy busy busy, but we make time daily to read. This could be as part of our English lesson, Phonics lesson, daily mindfulness time or our end of the day class read.

Here is a round up of our weekly reading in 2AP from 29th January - 2nd February.

Wigglesbottom Primary: Toilet Ghost by Pamela Butchart

Life at Wigglesbottom is often lived on the edge. A class talent show becomes a thing of great mystery, a broken tap in the boys' loos becomes the story of the Toilet Ghost and an ant farm brought in for show and tell results in an itchy carpet curse.

My class adore the Wigglesbottom Primary books and the illustrations by Becka Moor are brilliant. They are an absolute joy to share at the end of the day as a class read and when finished, the children love reading them independently. After a lovely reading lesson this afternoon, we may have gone onto Amazon and Shark in the Pool may be arriving tomorrow.. We shall see!

Izzy Gizmo by Pip Jons

Izzy Gizmo is a girl who loves to invent, but her inventions never seem to work the way she wants them to. And that makes her really cross! When she finds a crow with a broken wing, she just has to help. But will she be able to put her frustrations to one side and help her new friend to fly again?

I shared this book with my class back in September when we were discussing one of our learning power tools - perseverance. There is a strong message about resilience and trying again which is wonderful for young children and particularly important in our class.

For the past two weeks we've been lucky enough to read it again and link our writing to it. The children adore Izzy Gizmo and have loved the interaction they've had with the author, Pip Jones, on twitter. It resulted in fantastic writing results, from character descriptions to diary entries.

Everybody's Welcome by Patricia Hegarty

Wouldn't it be great if you could build a home that opened its doors to everyone - tall or short, fat or thin, rich or poor... Well, perhaps if everybody pitches in to help, one little mouse can achieve that dream. 

Everybody's Welcome is a lovely story about empathising with others and helping them in their hour of need. Mouse shows compassion and kindness towards many different animals and it led us into a class discussion beautifully. A beautiful story of tolerance and diversity, with equally beautiful illustrations (my class adored them!).

The Squirrels who Squabbled

Two greedy squirrels learn to share. Greedy squirrels Cyril and Bruce both have their sights on a very special prize: The very last nut of the season! As the nut bounces crazily through the forest, the squirrels race after it, between the trees, over boulders, down the river and - ARGH! Right to the edge of a waterfall. Working together might be the only way to save themselves now...

My class absolute love books by Rachel Bright and this one is no different. It highlights the pointlessness of squabbling and how wonderful friendship is. A perfect book to share as part of circle time or a PSHE lesson on friendship, which is just what we did :-).

Don't Leap, Larry!

Larry Lemming is unlike all others, he has a mind of his own. Whilst all the other lemmings are making burrows ready for winter, Larry goes sledging with puffins, eats pizza and wears hoola skirts.

This is a beautifully illustrated and amusing story to share with children, which will remind them that it is ok to think independently. My class really enjoyed the story and the illustrations. We had a wonderful discussion about being individuals after reading it, which led into a very calming mindfulness art activity. Super!

The Chocolate Monster

Breaking news: a chocolate monster is on the loose! Keep watch, and close all cupboard doors. No chocolate bar's secure. If left at large, The Chunk will turn at your house, for sure. And worse still this fiend will make sure you take the blame! 

This is the perfect book to share aloud with children. The rhyming text is fun and my class adored the illustrations. I even caught some children during golden time that week turning me into a chocolate monster and creating wanted signs.... 😂

Little Red Reading Hood

Little Red Reading Hood LOVES reading books and making up stories of her own. When she meets a cunning wolf while on her way to the library, he convinces her to stray from the path and read for a little while. But hasn’t she read this in a story before? Perhaps it’s time she came up with a new ending . . .

I absolutely loved this from the moment it arrived on my doorstep. The illustrations are absolutely beautiful and the rhymes are wonderful. An incredibly imaginative story which had my class inspired. A week on and I spotted some children looking through the book today and creating their own imaginative journeys. How lovely!

The Light Jar by Lisa Thompson

Sometimes you read a book you enjoy so much, that you wish you had wrote it yourself - this book is one of those.

In the dead of night, Nate and his mum run away to a tumbledown cottage in the middle of a forest. When Mum heads off for food and doesn't return, Nate is left alone and afraid, with shadows closing in all around him. But comfort comes from the most unexpected of places - a mysterious girl on a cryptic treasure hunt, and the surprising reappearance of someone from his past.

This book had me absolutely captivated on Sunday afternoon. The tension and suspense that this book creates meant that I just couldn't put it down. I really came to care about Nate, and felt like I was there with him through everything he was experiencing.

Lisa Thompson has addressed an incredibly tough and tricky subject in such a brave and sensitive manner. This is a wonderfully poignant book to give to children going through a difficult time, however I would advise teachers/parents to read it themselves first. 

Both The Light Jar and The Goldfish Boy are beautifully written and I cannot wait for more books from Lisa.

Tin by Padraig Kenny

Christopher is a real boy with a real soul who was orphaned in a fire. He works for Mr Absalom who is an engineer of mechanical children. These eccentric, loyal and totally individual mechanicals become Christopher's family. But after a devastating accident, a secret is revealed and Christopher's world is changed forever. Christopher goes missing and it is up to his loyal mechanical family to try and rescue him.

The characters Padraig Kenny has created are brilliant. I grew to love and care about each character even more with every page I read. They each have such an individual personality which is written about wonderfully, and their questions about their place in the 'proper' human world are touching. I grew especially attached to Round Rob - love him!

As someone who loved the Wizard of Oz as a child (even receiving a Tin Man costume for Christmas one year 😂), I adored the narrative of this story. The themes of love and friendship are explored brilliantly with echoes to the Iron Giant too. The story moves along quickly and there are plenty of twists and turns, from mechanical action to moments of reflection.

This is Kenny's debut book and it celebrates hope and friendship wonderfully. For a children's book, it explores the meaning of being human and how we can be better people brilliantly. This would be an excellent class read to lead onto further discussions.

I can't wait to see what Padraig Kenny produces next.

January Reads

I know I'm probably on my own when I say January is probably my favourite month of the year. Christmas has been and gone, and my birthday too, but I'm feeling voucher rich with Waterstones vouchers and ready to spend them all in one go.... Here is what I read during January and my thoughts on each. Enjoy :-)

A Tale for the Time Being - Ruth Ozeki

This Buddhism related novel was a Christmas gift from my brother. It is the story of Ruth, a Japanese-American living on an island off the coast of Vancouver with her husband, and Nao, a Japanese teenager who was forced to move back to Tokyo after her father lost his job in America.

The story begins with Nao's diary being washed up on the shore of Ruth's island, encased in a Hello Kitty lunchbox. Ruth assumes that it must be debris from the Tohoku tsunami in 2011. Ruth goes on a desperate search on the internet for evidence of Nao and her family, and in doing so, becomes obsessed with the situation.

A 2012 Man Booker Prize nominated novel, this is just so real. The characters are wholly believable, the story is compelling and it's filled with Japanese culture. As somebody with no knowledge of Japanese culture before having read this book, these are helpfully explained with footnotes.

Number the Stars - Lois Lowry

Number the Stars is the story of ten year old Annemarie living in Denmark in 1943. Annemarie's best friend, Ellen, is Jewish, and the book tells how Annemarie's family get involved in smuggling Jews out of Denmark to Sweden in fishing boats.

Lois Lowry explains in the afterword that, although this story is fictional, the events the story recounts really did happen to thousands of families. Before reading this story, I had no knowledge about the rescue of Danish Jews, so it was interesting to learn that around eight thousand Jews were evacuated to Sweden meaning over 80% of Danish Jews survived the Holocaust.

I really enjoyed this simple but powerful book. It humanises people and shows their strength and courage. I strongly recommend it to KS2+ children and adults alike.

Raymie Nightingale - Kate DiCamillo

Raymie is a ten year old girl who has known for two days that her dad has snuck off from her mum with another woman. Raymie has a plan to win the Little Miss Central Florida Tire competition in hope that her dad will see her in the newspaper, and be so proud that he will return home to her and her mum.

The three girls in the story are all very different, but their loneliness brings them together. I absolutely adored each one of the girls and they won my heart for sure. A perfect read for KS2.

Lies We Tell Ourselves - Robin Talley

Lies We Tell Ourselves is the story of Sarah Dunbar and nine black students who are the first to attend an all-white school in Virginia. It begins on their first day at the new school where they are not protected by their police escort. It is also the story of one white girl at the school, Linda, her father is the community's main support of segregation. Linda is set against integration but is forced to work with Sarah on a school project.

I had some knowledge of the civil rights moment before reading LWTO, however I didn't realise the extent of the violence and hatred which is powerfully written about in this book. It is told in dual narration which shows the contrast of both girls narratives and it focuses on issues of racism and LGBT.

Wigglesbottom Primary: The Magic Hamster - Pamela Butchart

Three more stories of primary school craziness in Miss Riley's class. Miss Riley knows what is happening, but class 2F are convinced the hamster is up to mischief.

The Wigglesbottom Primary books are a massive hit in my Year 2 class as an end of day read, and this was yet another hit. This was funny, engaging and my class can always recognise the classroom drama that Pamela Butchart shares in our own class. I was heavily persuaded by 29 six year olds to buy The Toilet Ghost immediately after finishing The Magic Hamster.

Inside Out and Back Again -  Thanhha Lai

In 1975, ten year old Ha lived in Saigon with her family. Her father was an officer in the Vietnamese Navy and was captured nine years before. The Vietnam War reaches her family home, and they are forced to flee to Alabama, America.

Inside Out and Back Again is written in verse, something I found difficult to begin with. However, the more I read of the book, the easier I found it. It felt more like how people would talk and felt fitting for a young girl feeling out of place. It is told from the point of view of a young child, and is the first book I have read that details what refugees endure and her transition to America is so real.

Sky Song - Abi Elphinstone

Confession: I haven't read any other Abi Elphinstone books.
Sky Song is the story of a girl named Eska who has been captured inside Winterfang Palace by an evil Ice Queen who rules Erkenwald.  Eska is imprisoned inside a cursed music box with no memories of who she is or why an evil Ice Queen wants to steal her voice.

I absolutely adored this story and the themes included. Challenging narrow-minded beliefs to becoming more open-minded and having tolerance of people. It made me wish I was a KS2 teacher so that I could read it again with a class.

The 1,000 Year Old Boy -  Ross Welford

Alfie Monk wants to be like any other 11 year old, except he's actually over one thousand years old. He longs for friendship, but knows himself and his mother must live a very quiet life. Alfie's mum dies in a fire, and he begins to think that he would prefer to grow up living a normal life.

This was such a heart-warming story celebrating friendship and trust. The different perspectives it is told from showcased how the three friends use their different strengths to support each other, and I know some KS2 children who raid my bookshelf will love this.

Piggy Handsome - Pip Jones

This is the story of a very confident guinea pig, named Piggy Handsome, who is having a meltdown. With the help of his budgie friend Jeffry, he faces obstacles on his journey to fame.

I inhaled this book one Saturday morning and found myself laughing till the end. My class are big fans of Pip Jones (Izzy Gizmo, The Chocolate Monster) and I know they are going to adore this as our next class read. We will be able to discuss some challenging vocabulary, whilst it will also challenge my different voices for characters (eek!).