Skip to main content

Third Grade Angels


Third Grade Angels
by Jerry Spinelli
Scholastic, 2013.  134 pgs.  Fiction

      The rhyme goes:  "First grade babies!  Second grade cats!  Third grade angels! Fourth grade rats!"
Spinelli has already written about Suds Morton's adventures in "Fourth Grade Rats," and here we find out what Suds was like in Third Grade.  He likes his teacher.  She gives out  halos to her third grade angels, one at a time,  after the first month of school, depending on their behavior. Suds wants to be first at everything, including the first to get a halo, so he is on his better-than-best behavior even when bad-kid Joey bothers him from the seat behind him, and when the other kids get bored with angel-like behavior and kind of slope out of the competition.  Suds even behaves at home, because he thinks Mrs. Simms has spies there.  No more calling his little sister Zippernose, or not eating his peas. Suds figures he's got it in the bag when he saves a dog from being run over in the street.  But something totally unexpected happens on First Halo of the Year Day which turns Suds' notions upside down and teaches him something very important about what makes a person a winner.

Comments

Popular posts from this blog

Dude, That's Rude! (Get Some Manners) by Pamela Espeland & Elizabeth Verdick

If there's one book today's kids need to read, it is Dude, That's Rude! (Get Some Manners) . The authors provide a fun format for teaching etiquette to children. They discuss proper behavior at home, at school, at other people's homes and in public places. The information is completely up-to-date with cellphone manners and netiquette included. Fun, cartoony illustrations are on practically every page giving the book great visual appeal. This book is perfect for boys and girls in the fourth grade or older. WARNING: Bodily functions are discussed.

Faces of the Moon by Bob Crelin

Faces of the Moon by Bob Crelin Illustrated by Leslie Evans Charlesburg; 2009; unpaged Faces of the Moon is a short nonfiction book that describes the different phases of the moon and why the moon appears like it does on certain nights. This book is short and sweet so even the youngest of moon lovers will enjoy it. The layout is simplistic and easy to follow. I don’t know much about the moon so I found it very interesting.

Review: The Factory

The Factory By Catherine Egan New York, NY : Scholastic Inc., 2025. Fiction. 306 pages.  Thirteen-year-old Asher Doyle has been invited to join the Factory, a secretive research facility in the desert which ostensibly extracts renewable energy from the electromagnetic fields of its young recruits. But Asher soon realizes something sinister is going on. Kids are getting sick. The adults who run the Factory seem to be keeping secrets. And the extraction process is not only painful and exhausting, but existentially troubling. Asher makes a handful of new friends who help him with an investigation that turns into a resistance, which turns into...a cliffhanger! The Factory is a page-turning sci-fi with multidimensional characters, an intriguing plot, and refreshingly straight-forward writing. Egan weaves in detail about climate crises and social unrest, making the story's dystopian setting feel rich and plausible. With its sophisticated themes and accessible storytelling, I would recomm...