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Health & Fitness

Holiday Read-Aloud For the Whole Family

Terrific short book to read aloud and spark family discussions over the holidays.

By Diane Gornell, Teacher Librarian 

 

because of mr. terupt (the author’s lower case, not mine!) by Rob Buyea has all the elements of a good family read-aloud. There’s drama, conflict, humor, tragedy, and forgiveness enough to keep both children and adults involved in the story and its characters. The book’s short chapters of four or fewer pages create perfect stopping points for busy families.

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The story follows the course of one school year of a fifth grade class and is told through the perspective of the seven main characters. Mr. Terupt is a rookie teacher. In one student’s words, “New teachers don’t know the rules, so you can get away with things the old timers would squash you for.” Well, Mr. Terupt may be new, but he’s no fool. While he doesn’t let his students get away with anything, he does make school both fun and challenging through his unusual assignments and activities.

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We learn about the students’ lives, the interactions with each other, their families, and their teacher. As in any family, there can be a number of different stories about the same event with each person looking at what happened from their own viewpoint.

 

In some ways the characters are stereotypes:  among the girls are mean, shy, smart, new, and overweight and just wanting to fit in roles. The boys group contains an impulsive prankster, brainiac, and a misfit who hates school. But I didn’t mind this because within the stereotypes the characters and their interactions are still interesting and the individual voices don’t sound formulaic.

 

One theme that runs throughout the book is Dollar Words. In this math assignment Mr. Terupt challenges his students to find real words that total exactly one dollar when the individual letter values are added together. “A” equals one cent, “B” equals 2 cents, “C” equals three cents, and so on. What an interesting way for children to enrich their vocabularies!

 

About half way through the school year a terrible accident impacts the entire class. Is it the teacher’s fault, or the administrator’s fault, or the fault of the students themselves? The students blame each other. This tragedy, the way the students work through it, and its outcome tears apart and then brings together the students and even their families.

 

because of mr. terupt can spark family discussions about relationships at school and at home, personal responsibility, making wise choices, and more. I found it to be athought provoking read that has appeal for both adults and children from about 3rd through 7th grades. Pick it up to put under the tree for a family Christmas gift, or read it during the holiday break.

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