Childrens Literature and Literacy

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Book Title: Stone Soup  

Author: Marcia Brown  

Summary: This book is a children's fairytale. It is the story of 3 soldiers who are on a journey together and lacking resources. The soldiers stumble upon a village, but the villagers are skeptical of the soldiers and hide their food from them. The soldiers stop at the villager's house and ask politely if they can spare some food and a place to sleep for the night. The soldiers persist and continue trying to find food and shelter from the peasants. Finally, as the soldiers grow desperate, they trick the villagers into giving them food by offering to make them “stone soup”. Because the villagers are very intrigued and want to learn how to make soup out of only stones. As the soldiers cook the stones, they continue to say, “this soup we be fit for a kid if only we had some carrots”. The soldiers continue to trick the villagers into giving them more and more ingredients until it is finished and is a full soup. The villagers and soldiers join one another for a feast and a party in the center of the village. The soldiers then leave the village with a happy ending.  

Analyze Author Craft: The author uses the story to show how the soldiers are resourceful and can trick the villagers into thinking they can magically make tasty soup from stones.  

My favorite part: My favorite part of the story was when the villagers continually trick their villagers. I think that this was very clever, and they go from being offered no food, to having the villager's thing they are magicians.  

Give Recommendation: I would recommend this book to students in late elementary school or middle school. I think it was a great story and illustrated how people who are different can in fact get along peacefully. One downside to the story is that it illustrates trickery. I think there is a possibility that it teacher the students how to get one over on people and that obviously isn't a good thing.