Author: Toni Morrison with Slade Morrison
Illustrator: Giselle Potter
Publisher: Hyperion Books for Children 1999.
This picture book is a charming tale of three different children with different interests who are all confined to living in a big box. Because Patty, Mickey, and Liza Sue could not follow rules their parents, teachers, and neighbors recommended they be sent to live in a big box because they couldn't handle their freedom.
Morrison cleverly plays with words and phrases and she uses end rhyme to tell this story which could make this book a great pick for fluency practice with young readers. But she also hints on some complex underlying themes that could open up deeper discussions with middle grades students. For example, Morrison uses situational irony in the gifts that the parents adorn their children with when they come to visit. These "gifts" include a record playing the sound of a living seagull and a film of a running brook. It could also be noted that the children in the novel have more insightful thinking than the adults. The following phrase is repeatedly expressed: "I know you are smart and I know that you think you're doing what is best for me. But if freedom is handled just your way then it's not my freedom or free."ouryouyouyoyou I think many students can easily connect to the children in the book by trying to do the right thing but getting in trouble for playing and being active and experiencing childhood in any way other than silently.
I really enjoyed this book and I too believe that there is a complex underlying theme in the book that is a great message for students, which sometimes we teachers unknowingly create for our students. Throughout the book the children do not really know why they are being but in this box for being who they are, but at the end of the story when the children break down the box they are reestablishing their freedom, thus being whoever they choose to be. I think, while rules are necessary in the classroom, students should be free to express themselves through their writing and writing should be a time of the day where students can be anything they want to be. Instead of being confined to a writing prompt that it set by the teacher. Overall though, this is a wonderful book and has a great message and presentation of text that all students could benefit from!
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