Communities
Communities > rural
All the Places to Love
A young boy talks about all his favorite places, those of his family and his grandparents, the farm, and the adjacent countryside. The book is a celebration of those natural settings where we are most alive and feel we belong.
| Author: MacLachlan, Patricia |
|
Artist in Overalls
Born into a poor farming family in Iowa, Grant Wood struggled to study art and earn a living. He chose to paint simple people and scenes with a classical feel, a style that became known as Regionalism.
| Author: Duggleby, John |
HSE Descriptors:
language arts - reading
|
Birches
On each page Ed Young illustrates trees and forests and the countryside, in browns and sepia tones, and presents them along with several lines of Robert Frost's well-known poem, "Birches." The poem is printed in its entirety again on the last two pages.
| Author: Frost, Robert |
HSE Descriptors:
language arts - reading
|
Black Potatoes
The causes and consequences of the Irish potato famine are examined, using individual portraits and anecdotes. Archival photographs, a map of the counties of Ireland, a bibliography, and a timeline complement the text.
| Author: Bartoletti, Susan |
HSE Descriptors:
social studies
|
Come Go With Me: Old-timer Stories from the Southern Mountains
The author recorded these oral histories of "Southern Mountain" old folks over a twenty-five year period in order to preserve aspects of community that were disappearing.
| Author: Thomas, Ray Edwin (collected by) |
|
Dear Mr. Rosenwald
This is a fictionalized story of one community's efforts to build a school based on the historical Rosenwald schools. These schools in the American South were financed by Julius Rosenwald of Sears Roebuck and required collaboration of black and white com
| Author: Weatherford, Carole Boston |
HSE Descriptors:
social studies
|
George Washington Carver
This biography of George Washington Carver, known as the "peanut man," is illustrated with his art work and archival photographs and includes notes, bibliographical resources and an afterword.
| Author: Bolden, Tanya |
HSE Descriptors:
social studies | science
|
George Washington Carver
This biography of George Washington Carver, known as the "peanut man," is illustrated with his art work and archival photographs and includes notes, bibliographical resources and an afterword.
| Author: Bolden, Tanya |
HSE Descriptors:
social studies | science
|
Gifts from the Sea
The lives of a lighthousekeeper and his daughter are changed by the discovery of a baby washed ashore after a shipwreck on the coast of Maine in the 1850's.
| Author: Kinsey-Warnock, Natalie |
|
Going Back Home: An Artist Returns to the South
This book is a partnership between African American artist, Michele Woods, who returned to the South and painted her family history, and author Toyomi Igus, who gave words to Woods's paintings.
| Author: Igus, Toyomi |
HSE Descriptors:
language arts - reading | social studies
|
Henry David's House
These seamlessly woven excerpts from Thoreau's Walden and the beautiful watercolor illustrations together describe constructing and living in the house at Walden Pond.
| Author: Schnur, Steven (ed.) |
HSE Descriptors:
language arts - reading
|
I Have Heard of a Land
A hardworking African American woman stakes a homestead claim in the Oklahoma Territory in the period after the Civil War. Told in rich, lyrical language, the beautifully illustrated story reminds us that African Americans were a part of the settlement o
| Author: Thomas, Joyce Carol |
HSE Descriptors:
social studies
|
Josepha
A boy narrates the story of his friend and protector, the immigrant young man Josepha, who had to leave school to work.
| Author: McGugan, Jim |
HSE Descriptors:
social studies
|
Log Cabin Quilt, The
Elvirey, her brother, grandmother, and father move to a log cabin in the Michigan woods after her mother dies. Granny's quilting scraps serve a greater purpose during a winter storm.
| Author: Howard, Ellen |
HSE Descriptors:
social studies
|
Memories of Survival
A mother and daughter create a narrative in stitchery and text of the mother's life in Poland during the Nazi occupation.This collection of memories of the holocaust provides a first hand account of danger, despair and hope. The detailed tapestries provid
| Author: Krinitz, Esther Nisenthal & Steinhardt, Bernice |
HSE Descriptors:
social studies
|
Mist over the Mountains
Memorable photographs and well-written text depict the history and present life in the geographic area known as Appalachia. The author includes a section on Further Reading.
| Author: Bial, Raymond |
HSE Descriptors:
social studies
|
More Choices: Stories for Adult New Readers
These three stories fit with George Ella Lyon's collection Choices, but were not included in the original collection because some readers found them too controversial. Our readers found them powerful and moving, addressing life situations that m
| Author: Lyon, George Ella |
|
My Great Aunt Arizona
Based on the author's great aunt, Arizona was born in a log cabin. All her life she dreamed of visiting far-away places. She became a teacher and never left the area, but taught several generations of children to share her dreams.
| Author: Houston, Gloria |
HSE Descriptors:
social studies
|
Other Side, The
Spurred by a letter from her grandmother saying that "they're pulling Shorter down," the poet returns to the people and places of her childhood in Shorter, Alabama. The poems are accessible and concise but filled with powerful feeling. Photographs from
Prairie Builders, The
At the Neal Smith National Wildlife Refuge in central Iowa, scientists are recreating a tall-grass prairie. Color photographs, a glossary, web sites, and an index document the difficult process of bringing back a small piece of the prairie.
| Author: Collard, Sneed B. III |
HSE Descriptors:
science | social studies
|
Song of Be
When Be was a child, she and her mother left their people--the Namibian Bushmen--to work on a white man's plantation. Spending time with her grandfather helps her forget how much she misses others. With Namibia on the verge of freedom, Be finds the cour
| Author: Beake, Lesley |
HSE Descriptors:
social studies
|
They Sought A New World
Through Kurelek's art and Margaret Englehart's additional text, this book tells the story of European immigrants to North America. In addition to describing issues like finding work and shelter, aspects of culture -- religion, maintaining cultural tradit
| Author: Kurelek, William |
HSE Descriptors:
social studies
|
Till Year's End
Following the format of a medieval book of hours, the book describes the labors of peasants month by month. The illustrations were inspired by those in early printed books. An Author's Note explains the calendar of medieval feast and holy days which was
| Author: Nilola, Lisa W. |
HSE Descriptors:
social studies
|
Traveling Cat, The
A young girl takes in a stray cat who stays long enough to have kittens before traveling on.
| Author: Lyon, George Ella |
|
Uncle Jed's Barbershop
A woman tells the story of her Uncle Jed, an African-American barber who traveled a regular route, saving his money for his own shop. When she became sick, he gave up his money for her operation, and when the Depression came, he lost everything again. F
| Author: Mitchell, Margaree K. |
HSE Descriptors:
social studies
|
Voices from the Fields
Photographs, poems, and interviews capture glimpses of life for today's migrant children.
| Author: Atkin, S. Beth |
HSE Descriptors:
social studies
|
Warm as Wool
Set in Ravenna, Ohio in 1803 and based on facts, this is a fictional account of the Ward family. Betsy Ward used a sockful of coins to buy sheep so that she could gather wool, spin cloth, and make clothes to keep her family warm.
| Author: Sanders, Scott R. |
HSE Descriptors:
social studies
|
Where Once There Was a Wood
With beautiful paper pulp illustrations and rich, alliterative text, the author raises the question of whether development is good ecology for the community.
White Wave
Retold from ancient sources, this Chinese tale of a lonely peasant's discovery of a magic shell relates the changes in his life that follow. The delicate pencil drawings by Ed Young complement the text. The author includes a note on the evolution of the
| Author: Wolkstein, Diane |
HSE Descriptors:
language arts - reading
|
With a Hammer for My Heart
When 15-year-old Lawanda befriends a WW II veteran living in an old school bus, she sets in motion events that will change her life and all those around her. The well-written story unfolds with each chapter telling the story from the point of view of eac
| Author: Lyon, George Ella |
|
Year on Monhegan Island, A
Photojournalist Julia Dean chronicles a year in the life of residents of Monhegan Island, a small island off the east coast of Maine. We learn about their culture, government, and economy, as well as a bit about part-time resident Jamie Wyeth.
| Author: Dean, Julia |
HSE Descriptors:
social studies
|
Communities > rural > rural life
Appalachia: The Voices of Sleeping Birds
The author and the illustrator, both from Appalachia, lovingly remember the people, the customs, and the dogs.
Ballet for Martha
This is the story of the collaboration between Martha Graham and Aaron Copeland that resulted in a famous work of music and a famous ballet. Reveals the work that happens behind the scenes by the choreographer, composer and set developer of a ballet.
| Author: Greenberg, J. & Jordan, S. |
HSE Descriptors:
language arts - reading | language arts - writing
|
Chanda's Secrets
Sixteen-year-old Chanda, who lives in a fictional sub-Saharan
country that is feeling the impact of HIV/AIDS psychologically(fears, lies, and sundered relationships)and socially (ostracism of tainted people, necessity of hiding), takes a courageous stand
| Author: Stratton, Allan |
HSE Descriptors:
social studies
|
Choices
George Ella Lyon, an accomplished writer of children's books, wrote this collection of stories (and its accompanying text, More Choices) specifically for adult new readers; in fact, she conferred with ABE students from Kentucky while creating the
| Author: Lyon, George Ella |
|
Fanny's Dream
A retelling of the Cinderella story, the book depicts the choices of Fanny Agnes, providing a humorous portrait of a strong woman.
Great Stone Face, The
The author retells a famous Hawthorne story about how a New England village interprets a mountain's "face" over the years as fulfilling the prophecy of revealing the noblest person of the time.
| Author: Schmidt, Gary/Hawthorne Nathaniel |
HSE Descriptors:
language arts - reading
|
In Coal Country
Living in a small Ohio mining town, a small girl tells of her family's life in the first part of this century.
| Author: Hendershot, Judith |
HSE Descriptors:
social studies
|
In November
As trees, animals, birds, and insects prepare for winter, people gather in warm homes to give thanks. Beautiful illustrations.
| Author: Rylant, Cynthia |
HSE Descriptors:
science
|
Jim the Boy
In a coming-of-age story set in Appalachia, Jim grows up as a town boy with his mother and uncles but finally makes friends with a mountain boy and meets his mountain grandfather.
Jip: His Story
Jip, a young orphan in the mid-1850s, lives on a farm, interacts with Put "the lunatic," and wonders about his past. Eventually he attends school and, with the help of Teacher (Lyddie from the Paterson book by the same name) and her Quaker friend, discov
| Author: Paterson, Katherine |
HSE Descriptors:
language arts - reading
|
Knoxville, Tennessee
This brief and beautifully illustrated poem celebrates a young child's summer in Knoxville, TN.
| Author: Giovanni, Nikki |
HSE Descriptors:
language arts - reading
|
Lights on the River
A migrant girl keeps memories of her grandma close as she deals with hard times in the United States. Her voice is strong, and the illustrations are stunning.
| Author: Thomas, Jane Resh |
|
Like Sisters on the Homefront
When 14-year-old Gayle gets into "trouble," she and her baby Jose leave New York City to live with family in rural Georgia. At first bored with and distressed about her situation, Gayle eventually makes friends with her cousin Cookie. Through "tellings" b
| Author: Williams-Garcia, Rita |
HSE Descriptors:
language arts - reading
|
Lily Cupboard, The
A Dutch farm family hides a Jewish girl, who in turn wants to protect a rabbit.
| Author: Oppenheim, Shulamith L. |
HSE Descriptors:
social studies
|
Raising Yoder's Barn
After a fire destroys Yoder's barn, the Amish community gathers to build a new one. The gorgeous illustrations extend the reader's view of Amish life. One reader found a "blackface" depiction of a boy, dirty from the ashes, negatively suggestive.
| Author: Yolen, Jane |
HSE Descriptors:
social studies
|
Slavery Time: When I Was Chillun
Excerpts from 12 oral histories from former slaves, gathered during the Depression by WPA workers, provide several perspectives about slave life as remembered by the people interviewed, who were in their 80s and 90s at the time of the interviews.
| Author: Hurmence, Belinda |
HSE Descriptors:
social studies
|
Something Permanent
Walker Evans' photographs of southern United States during the Depression years are stark and haunting, and Cynthia Rylant's short poems describe their stories beautifully.
| Author: Rylant, Cynthia |
HSE Descriptors:
language arts - reading | social studies
|
Stories I Ain't Told Nobody Yet
A collection of 49 poems, these vignettes of Appalachian life are funny, sad, moving, and silly. Not all of them are of great quality; teachers may want to pick and choose among them. The poem (on pg. 50) on abuse is powerful and likely to provoke good
| Author: Carson, Jo |
HSE Descriptors:
social studies
|
Talking with Tebe
Editor Lyons collected these excerpts about Clementine Hunter, considered one of America's finest folk artists, from magazine and newspaper articles and tape-recorded interviews. The artist's work illustrates the book.
| Author: Lyons, Mary E. (Ed.) |
HSE Descriptors:
language arts - reading
|
This Is the Rope: A Story from the Great Migration
A rope found by a little girl becomes a multigenerational object to her family and helps to tell the story of their migration from the South. It has many uses and eventually becomes a storytelling prompt.
| Author: Woodeson, Jacqueline |
HSE Descriptors:
language arts - reading
|
Tucker Pfeffercorn
This retelling of Rumpelstiltskin is set in small town Southern USA. The dialogue and dialect are delightful, and the illustrations by one of America's finest artists also contribute to telling the tale.
Communities > rural > rural life > farms
All the Places to Love
A young boy talks about all his favorite places, those of his family and his grandparents, the farm, and the adjacent countryside. The book is a celebration of those natural settings where we are most alive and feel we belong.
| Author: MacLachlan, Patricia |
|
Auction, The
In this sad intergenerational story, a boy and his grandfather reminisce the night before their farm is put up for sale.
Big Jabe
This tall tale relates how Jabe helped slaves.
Borning Room, The
The narrator remembers growing up in southern Ohio in the 19th century, remembers farm life, celebrates her relatives with their varying ideas about slavery and religion, remembers her part in hiding slaves.
| Author: Fleischman, Paul |
HSE Descriptors:
social studies
|
Christmas Tree Farm
Photos accompany this simple text about the activities that take place throughout the year at a Christmas tree farm in Rhode Island.
Cracked Corn and Snow Ice Cream
Almanac information and family history are given for each month in sections called Dates and Festivals, Farmer's Calendar, Worth Knowing, and Worth Cooking.
Drylongso
Drylongso, which takes place west of the Mississippi in 1975, is the story of a poor farming family's battle with a drought. Drylongso, "a youth imbued with simple human kindness . . . a folk hero" (author's notes) arrives, and with him comes ho
| Author: Hamilton, Viginia |
|
Family Farm
Two children learn that their family is in danger of losing its farm. They devise a plan for saving it.
Farm Summer 1942, The
Beautifully illustrated by Barry Moser, this reminiscence tells the story of a young boy's summer months at his grandparent's farm during World War II.
Gathering of Days, A
This book, subtitled A New England Girl's Journal, 1830-32, is a fictitious diary kept by a fourteen-year-old girl during the last few years she spent on her family's farm. During these months Catherine's father remarried, her closest friend died of feve
| Author: Blos, Joan W. |
HSE Descriptors:
social studies
|
Gratefully Yours
Orphaned by a New York tenement fire in 1920, Hattie rides an orphan train to Nebraska where she joins the Jansen household, Henry and his wife Elizabeth. The story relates the loss and healing process that both Hattie and Elizabeth experience. The stor
| Author: Buchanan, Jane |
HSE Descriptors:
social studies
|
Haystack
The uses of the old-fashioned haystack are brought back to life throughout the seasons.
Longitude Prize, The
This history documents the competition between "ocean clocks" and "lunars" to win the 20,000 pound prize (about $12 million today) from the British Parliament for a replicable and simple way to determine longitude at sea. The story follows John Harrison,
| Author: Dash, Joan |
HSE Descriptors:
math | science
|
Morning Milking
Although one OLRC reviewer was concerned that urban readers might not recognize the relevance of this quiet, reflective book, we found this gentle story of a farm child wishing she could make time stand still a lovely celebration of life, of barns and ani
| Author: Morris, Linda Lowe |
|
Night the Bells Rang, The
This short novel (76 pages), told from the point of view of a farm boy, tells the story of Mason's struggles with a bully, and of his growing up. Although the book has the feel of a reminiscence, the emotions are complex and the characters ring true.
| Author: Kinsey-Warnock, Natalie |
|
Out of the Dust
Set in Oklahoma during the Dust Bowl years of the Depression, this powerful book tells in unobtrusive blank verse the story of personal tragedy and community hardship through the experiences of Billy Jo, a 15-year-old girl. The book is so credible that
| Author: Hesse, Karen |
HSE Descriptors:
language arts - reading | social studies
|
Thunderstorm
A wordless book that follows a storm through Mid-western farm country with only the times listed of the storm.Thunderstorm is a valuable, breathtaking insight into one of the Mid-west's most natural occurrences.
| Author: Geisert, Arthur |
HSE Descriptors:
science | language arts - writing
|
Tortilla Factory, The
This very simple text describes the process for making tortillas, from planting to preparation to eating for the strength to plant, etc.
Very Best of Friends, The
When a farmer dies, his wife deals with her grief by ignoring (hating) his favorite cat, until she finally realizes that they could find companionship with each other.
Waiting for the Evening Star
This beautifully illustrated book is about Berty, a small boy who lives a happy life in a Vermont farming community. Berty's life changes when his older brother, Luke, decides to leave the family farm to become a soldier in WWI.
| Author: Wells, Rosemary |
HSE Descriptors:
social studies
|
What You Know First
A young girl does not want to leave the family farm that is being sold. She resolves her feelings realistically. The woodcut illustrations that look like old color-tinted photographs add veracity to the text.
| Author: MacLachlan, Patricia |
|
Winter Room, The
This book tells the story of Eldon, a boy growing up in the mid-20th century in rural Minnesota. He and his brother Wayne work hard to help out on the farm, but have time for fun and adventures too. After a short introduction, the book is structured in
Year of Fire, The
Grandpa tells granddaughter about the worst fire he has ever known, a fire that happened when the grandfather was a child. (based on a true story)
Communities > rural > small town life
Birds on a Wire
Renga poem (meaning linked verse in which one poet writes a verse and the other poet adds another verse, and so on) built around the day to day happenings of a small town. The authors trade stanza and bounce around the town as though they were observing
| Author: Lewis, J. Patrick & Paul Janeczko |
HSE Descriptors:
language arts - reading | social studies
|
Ellen Foster
11-year-old Ellen tells her own story in this "Oprah Book about a foster childhood." She is an amazingly resilient child and an amazingly perceptive observer of others.
Jim the Boy
In a coming-of-age story set in Appalachia, Jim grows up as a town boy with his mother and uncles but finally makes friends with a mountain boy and meets his mountain grandfather.
Long Way From Chicago, A
Subtitled "A Novel in Stories," this is a book about Joey and Mary Alice, who leave their home in Chicago each summer during the Depression to spend a week with Grandma Dowdel, who lives in a very small downstate town and who is, to say the least, an unfo
Moving Mama to Town
Enterprising Freddy James moves his mother and younger brother to town after his father leaves and the farm fails. He works at the local saloon where he learns from everyone he meets.
| Author: Young, Ronder Thomas |
|
Poetry for Young People: Edna St. Vincent Millay
Beautifully illustrated collection of Edna St. Vincent Millay's poetry. The volume also includes a sketch of the poet's life.
| Author: Francis Schoonmaker |
HSE Descriptors:
language arts - reading
|
Silent Boy, The
Katy,the young and curious daughter of a small-town doctor living in 1908, learns about life, death, and social distinctions from her family and her friend, Jacob, who is "touched."
Under the Shadow of Wings
Obie, a developmentally disabled boy dies causing a variety of emotional response from his friend Tatnall, an 11-year-old girl.
Up the Tracks to Grandma's
A girl describes her visits to her grandmother's home in a small-town Ohio in the middle 1900s, a time when her widowed grandmother plucked her own chickens, shoveled her own coal, and could not read English.
| Author: Hendershot, Judith |
|
Waiting to Waltz
Reminiscences of life in the small town of Beaver are told as poems from a young girl's point of view.
War Boy: A Country Childhood
The author describes his childhood in a small coastal town in England, which was often bombed during WW II. He offers technical descriptions of gas masks, bomb shelters, etc., as well as describing the games children played and how they interacted with s
| Author: Foreman, Michael |
HSE Descriptors:
social studies
|
Whale Port
In this book about a fictitious combination of real places, the text and colored-pencil drawings present the chronological development of a New England whaling town and its related businesses. The use of cut away art provides a glimpse inside the building
| Author: Foster, Mark |
HSE Descriptors:
social studies
|
Communities > rural > villages
Anno's Journey
Anno arrives by small boat, bargains for a horse, and begins a journey across Europe that crosses countries and merges past with present. The reader sees quiet villages, working farms, towering castles, and bustling cities. This world is populated with
Birds on a Wire
Renga poem (meaning linked verse in which one poet writes a verse and the other poet adds another verse, and so on) built around the day to day happenings of a small town. The authors trade stanza and bounce around the town as though they were observing
| Author: Lewis, J. Patrick & Paul Janeczko |
HSE Descriptors:
language arts - reading | social studies
|
Color of My Words, The
This is an easy-reading novel, part poetry and part prose, about Ana Rosa, a young writer who is growing up poor in a seaside village in the Dominican Republic where she learns about family community, the merengue, and the power of words.
| Author: Joseph, Lynn |
HSE Descriptors:
social studies
|
Flood
As Sarajean and her family prepare for and deal with the devastating Midwest floods of 1993, they discover what is truly important during a time of trouble.
Good Masters! Sweet Ladies!
This Newberry Award winner gives voice to residents of a medieval English village circa 1255. Poems in monologue form interspersed with explanatory passages bring the village to life. The book includes a map locating the characters in the village and an
| Author: Schlitz, Laura Amy |
HSE Descriptors:
social studies
|
Secret-Keeper, The
This is a fairy tale about Kalli, the secret-keeper, who takes others' secrets on so that they can be released from them. All the bad secrets threaten to make her ill until the townspeople come to her rescue.
Waiting for the Owl's Call
This narrative is rich in beautiful language - similes, personifications that describes the daily lives of Afghanistani children who work at rug looms looms using ancient patterns handed down from their ancestors. The narrator mentally creates new patter
| Author: Whelan, Gloria |
HSE Descriptors:
social studies
|
Waiting for the Owl's Call
This narrative is rich in beautiful language - similes, personifications that describes the daily lives of Afghanistani children who work at rug looms looms using ancient patterns handed down from their ancestors. The narrator mentally creates new patter
| Author: Whelan, Gloria |
HSE Descriptors:
social studies
|
Wolf of Gubbio, The
A legend tells the story of a wolf who terriorizes a community until the boy who became St.Francis of Assisi, negotates an agreement.
Year Down Yonder, A
This is the sequel to A Long Way From Chicago. Both books have won awards, the Newbery Medal for this one. Mary Alice goes to live with her spunky, trouble-making grandma in rural Illinois because the Depression has torn her family apart.
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