The Miraculous Journey of Edward Tulane by Kate DiCamillo

Great Children's Author (ages 8-11 years)

We adopted two new books in third grade this past year. Kate DiCamillo was a hit with both of her books: Tales of Despereaux and The Miraculous Journeys of Edward Tulane. I have to say that the kids absolutely loved both of these books. The characters were endearing. Students couldn't wait for our novel time each week. We spent Friday afternoons reading through the novels. Since our normal reading curriculum occupies the better part of our week, we save our Friday afternoons for putting the curriculum away and just diving into our good novel study. Not only is the time spent reading, but students are also engaged in related activities (i.e. vocabulary, character webs, comparison/contrast of characters, etc...) I would highly recommend both of these books for novel studies.