Give Me A Break!

I can't be the only mom - or dad - out there who's really really eager for break to be over and for school to start again! I actually thought that my boys' squabbles might get physical last night. Yikes.

No, really, they love each other!
Hallmark Channel, take me away!
Enter this clever book, based on one mom's creative {wit's end} idea 
to help mediate her ten-year-old twins one summer break.

Click graphic for purchasing info
Set up like a real journal, this treasure had me in stitches from cover to cover. Actually, I had to laugh to keep from crying because its authenticity made it so hilariously poignant.

Journey with these siblings through the pages of their summer right after fourth grade. It starts with them as quite argumentative and combative, but it morphs into a super account of a sibling summer side-by-side. The doodles and drawings add a splash of fun and flair that actually had me wishing I had a classroom of my own in which I could teach perspective with this as my next read-aloud.

For kicks, here's a picture of me with my siblings in the summer of 1976. 


Notice that we three older kids are each just a year apart. With children so close together in age, my parents firmly believed that working side-by-side would keep those sibling squabbles at bay, so I really connected with this mom's unity assignment that her kids journal their summer days away. 
{Sometimes I think I'd have rather been journaling than milking cows!}
Of course, I'd springboard a writing idea of my own
to teach point-of-view or empathy or something like that.

So, check out this engaging book (and its two sequels),
grab a KitKat candy bar, and repeat after me:
Give me a break!

Happy second semester.






1 comment

I really enjoy hearing from my readers; thanks for sharing your reflections with us!