Great Middle Grade Reads discussion

WOW! I have just started reading the One and Only Ivan by Katherine Applegate to my fourth graders. WE LOVE IT so far. The kids are already making clucking noises and "awwwws" in all the right places. YES! another great pick for my read-aloud. Ivan the gorilla is the narrator of the story. He has a two best friends, Stella the elephant and Bob the dog. The author does a great job of getting students to see how awful it is to be a gorilla in a cage for 12 years without actually saying so. Can't wait too see what's next!

I'm glad to hear kids like The One and Only Ivan. I was lucky enough to win it on FirstReads and I enjoyed it.

Read this with my granddaughter. There were times we both cried. We loved this book.

Kammera, I haven't read the One and Only Ivan because I was afraid it would be too painful, so I don't know what resources the author provides in the book. Does she list the Dian Fossey Gorilla Fund? If not, I hope you will share information with your fourth graders about Dian Fossey and how she worked to help gorillas. Her site has a "How Kids Can Help" page:

http://gorillafund.org/how-kids-help

Best,

Anna Olswanger
Author of Greenhorn

The reason this book works so well is that it personifies Ivan the gorilla without overhumanizing him. He's still believable as a gorilla. He does accomplish something almost magical, but to the reader it seems possible. Very clever.

Much more effective than preaching about animal rights.

I really loved this book--much more than I thought I would as I am not normally a lover of books with animals as characters. Two things I really liked about this book. First, the relationship between Ivan and the baby elephant is just incredible. Like many people, Ivan does not feel he will be able to do what his friend asked him too--to give a better life to the baby. Yet, he finds a way to do this. Ivan's challenges are so...human. Next, I really liked the greyness of the human characters, especially the owner. His care of the animals is clearly negligent, but it is much easier to see him as a misguided human. When the humans are just evil, then it is harder to see yourselves in them, which I believes limits the impact on everyday people.

Here's a link to Zoo Atlanta's page about the real Ivan. Ivan died last summer at age 50.

http://www.zooatlanta.org/ivan

Anna wrote: "Kammera, I haven't read the
One and Only Ivan
because I was afraid it would be too painful, so I don't know what resources the author provides in the book. Does she list the Dian Fossey Gorilla..."

Oh thank you!
I most definitely will. The kids at school are still sad there isn't more to read!

Nikolas wrote: "Well. I guess I've decided what my next read is gonna be! Not usually a fan of books told by animals anymore, but this just sounds too good. Thanks everyone :)"

Melissa wrote: "The reason this book works so well is that it personifies Ivan the gorilla without overhumanizing him. He's still believable as a gorilla. He does accomplish something almost magical, but to the re..."

Yay! you will wonder why the book read so fast!

I loved this book! It was a beautiful story. There were several times when I got very jiggly-lipped.

Ooh, I LOVE this book!! The "voice" of Ivan in the story is just wonderful - and although it is terribly sad in places, it is ultimately so uplifting (without resorting to Disney-mushy-happy-endings) and anyway, I think it's important for a book to challenge you emotionally. This is a WONDERFUL book and I recommend it to any one. In fact, I did to my husband who would normally never read MG and he was hooked and loved it - and he's a really fussy reader!

Plus although it's a very short book and looks "simple" with short paragraphs, as a writer, I can say that it was probably incredibly difficult to write - it's actually much harder to say things with "less" than with more. Katherine Applegate did a great job saying so much, with so little and painting such wonderful images.

Hsin-Yi

I have used this as a read aloud for 2 years in 4th grade. It engages everyone! My students absolutely have loved it. I have found that the students are very willing to jump off into related discussion when they love a book. This has lead to their research on zoos and humane treatment for animals, reports on animals, editing to write your message succinctly,and more. Because the author used a format of very short chapters that was new to us, we began to recognize structures in other books. This even lead us to the Moxy Maxwell series, which also has chapters as short as a single sentence. These have special appeal to some of the readers, along with the fun of reading a book with a huge number of chapters.

Finally had a chance to read Ivan. Loved the voice. Loved his Gorilla-ness -- Ivan's thoughts were just what you'd expect a Gorilla to have. And I loved the fact that the story had a sweet ending.

I absolutely LOVED this book because at times you laughed and at time you cried, but it was a good book the whole way

What I love about The One And Only Ivan is how much children treasure it. The other day a new student in my class picked it up to read, read the first page and then gasped 'I love it!' The students around her saw what she was reading and nodded knowingly and then asked if I would read some of it to them again they commented on how all the space around the words gave you time to think and savour them and, as one said, it just made the words feel more chosen and gorilla-like somehow. Fantastic!

I loved this book, and it is great for young readers.

The One And Only Ivan is one of my favourite books. I read it to my daughters months ago and it has stayed with all of us in the way a childhood book should :)

I am starting this week - and just heard that this book was inspired by a true story in the U.S. So now really intrigued to read :)

Megan wrote: "What I love about The One And Only Ivan is how much children treasure it. The other day a new student in my class picked it up to read, read the first page and then gasped 'I love it!' The students..."
Megan, I have has the same experience. Every student, book lovers, animals lovers, and even those terribly unhappy in school, who claim to hate books, and try to sit in the corner and not listen, LOVE something about this book. I read it expecting it to be a book I would read to my students painlessly, but I LOVE it, too. It has a secret something.

We had The One and Only Ivan as our Book of the Month in 2019.

To read the discussions on that, go to this thread