The Flute Player: An Apache Folktale

Title: The Flute Player
Author: Michael Lacapa
Genre: Multicultural Literature
Summary: This retold Apache Folktale is an old love story about a flute player. The flute player falls in love with a young girl, from another village, at a social dance. The girl discovers that she loves listening to the boy playing his flute each morning by the river in the canyon. After the girl stops hearing the boy playing his flute, she becomes ill and passes away. The young boy returns from his hunting trip and know that his love is no longer waiting to hear him. Once the boy finds out about his love passing, he goes to play the flute at her graveside.

How to use: Folktales are great resources to use in the classroom. They allow students to see a different side of history. This Apache Folktale would be a great tool to use as a read-aloud during a Native American unit. To further the use of this book, many elementary students learn to play recorders in music. This folktale would also be a great encouragement for students who are doing so.

Born To Read

Title: Born to Read
Author: Judy Sierra
Genre: Fiction
Summary: This book is about a young boy, Sam, who uses reading for everything in his life. Throughout the book, he uses his ability to read to conquer new things. For example, Sam uses reading to win a race. The reason Sam won the race was because he read all about bikes and how to repair them. Eventually the story shows Sam using reading to help him become whatever he pleases; whatever career path he desires.


How to use: Not only would I use this book at the beginning of the year to encourage reading, but I would use it to help aid my students rhyming. It is a good example of how authors do not use rhyming for every line in their book, but they're able to balance rhyming sentences and non-rhyming sentences. 

Breakfast in the Rainforest: A Visit with Mountain Gorillas

Title: Breakfast in the Rainforest: A Visit with Mountain Gorillas
Author (Traveling Photographer): Richard Sobol
Genre: Non-fiction
Summary: This nonfiction book explains the "critically endangered" species of Mountain Gorillas. The entire text is a documentary of a traveling photographer's journey to photograph the Mountain Gorillas. The photographer was able to capture some incredible photographs. The author explains the intense process it takes to photograph this incredible species.

How to Use: When teaching about different animals, this book will be a great resource for images of Mountain Gorillas. Unfortunatley, this book does not focus on the animals facts/life itself. This book could also be used in the classroom to stem discussions about endangered species. Lastly, this book is a great example of a differnent style of nonfiction book. Instead of being a strictly factual presentation, this is more of a documentation.