8.) Home of the Brave by Katherine Applegate
AR Level – 3.5
Points – 3
Interest Level – Middle to Upper Grades
To those of you who are looking at the 3.5 reading level and discounting this as a possibility for your jr. high book shelves…don’t. Home of the Brave is a book written in poems and while that may not sound like a big deal, I think it is important to expose students to many different types of writing styles. The poems are not rhyming little kid poems, but stanzas that tell the story of a refugee teenager named Kek. Kek is sent to Minnesota to live with his aunt and cousin after a deadly civil war attack on his African village leaves his father and brother dead and his mother missing. Did you just raise one eyebrow and say Minnesota? I know that is what I thought while reading this book, but as it turns out, 13% of Minnesota’s foreign-born residents are from Africa. (This information was taken from the Author’s Reading guide in the back of the book. I LOVE the comprehensive guide for teachers to use in the classroom with their students!)
Kek has a gentle disposition and a positive outlook on his new life even though it is extremely confusing at times. As a reader, we get the opportunity to experience such things as snow and french fries through the sensations of Kek who has no knowledge of such things. The scenes in the ESL classroom are eye-openers through which students can develop a better understanding of what it must be like to enter our country not knowing one English word.
The struggles Kek endures during his relocation to America is something that every student should read so they understand the need for acceptance. Both to be accepted as a foreigner and the need to accept others for their differences and what they can bring to our country.
I will be using this book during our study of immigration. While our Social Studies textbook focuses primarily on Ellis Island and the history of immigration, I think this will be a perfect addition that will allow a modern day connection.
Kek is the perfect character to make you realize America really is the “Home of the Brave”.
My niece, Allison, came into our lives thirty years ago. She has provided us with a glimpse of another world that we can’t begin to understand, only because we are limited in both our intellect and ability to “see” things the way she does. As a child, Allison “danced with the fairies” and was lost in thoughts that we could only wish to share with her. She was first diagnosed with significant developmental delays with “islands of ability” or possible “childhood schizophrenia”. When Allison was five, her pediatrician called my sister, Diana, at work. He had just returned from attending a conference in California and was very excited to have found an “answer”. Allison eventually was “labeled” autistic, and was placed in special classes in schools in Albuquerque, New Mexico. Diana worked as a political consultant at the state and federal levels, and used any and all connections she had to educate herself on autism. She became an officer in the Autism Society of America, and became proactive in securing the best help to enable Allison to become all she could be. Eventually we learned that Allison’s symptoms were best described as Asperger’s Syndrome, and she was not only very high functioning, but had an IQ that was far above anyone else in our family. When she was twelve, Allison described to me a book that she was reading about “parallel universes” in terms I could understand. My “Allison Stories” include finding piles of miniature notebook pages under her bed with hieroglyphics of different thoughts and messages filling each page, all easily translated by her at the age of eight. On a visit I took her to buy a bathing suit, and she absolutely needed the black one-piece with a huge beautiful sequined pineapple filling the front. How could I refuse? She loved nothing more than to sit in front of the television under a huge open golf umbrella watching Comedy Central and laughing with the audience. Her humor is quick, dry, and catches you off-guard bringing you to your knees. She has been to “Burning Man”, belonged to a tango club, belly-dances, and has taken Diana and me on a trip to southern France for the “Gathering of the Gypsies”. On our trip to Paris, her first request was to go to the cemetery to see the grave of Jim Morrison. On our trip through the Louvre, she was our personal guide. Just this past Sunday her post on Facebook read, 
I had to title this blog Reflections #1 since there is no way I will be able to pack everything into one post. Also I am habitually the type of person that looks back at presentations and conversations wishing I could add or tweek something. I know, I know…get some counseling already! So, in order to allow myself some more time to think back through the past week at NECC, I have set myself up to post a series of reflections. 
I can not tell you how many times I heard those two words last week during our hosted workshops. And NO it wasn’t in reference to Mom and me 😉 15 new MSi Wind netbooks were getting all of the compliments. Quite frankly, they were well deserved! Not only are they very cute little computers, they worked very well for our hands-on sessions where we want each participant to be working on a computer while we guide them through the workshop. We hosted 7 hands-on sessions last week where the Winds got their first workout. I could not be happier with their performance. We did hear several participants comment on how small they were, but in order for us to have a portable lab that is easy for us to manage, we had to go small. Now if I can get my hands on 20 more for my classroom…that would be GREAT! MSi Wind people…are you listening?
