A Country Schoolhouse [Hardcover]

Lynne Barasch (Author)

Book Description

Age Level: 4 and up | Grade Level: P and up

Tales from a small country school

In 1940, Grandpa's country school had no lunchroom or indoor bathroom and used wood-burning stoves for heat, but it wasn't completely different from today's schools. Students studied spelling and geography, United States and world history, and learned the names of all the United States presidents. And Grandpa was always the smartest -- that is, up until fifth grade, when Kaye Brush arrived.

With her sprightly watercolor-and-ink illustrations, including endpapers featuring a quaint map of the community, Lynne Barasch draws on family history to give today's schoolchildren a charming inside-the-classroom look at life and learning in a three-room country schoolhouse.

Editorial Reviews

From School Library Journal

Grade 1-5–Barasch transports readers to a simpler era in public education, long before "cable in the classroom" ever darkened the double doors of most modern schools. Grandpa describes the three-room country schoolhouse that he attended in the 1940s, which held grades one through eight, with lessons for several grades taking place simultaneously in each room. Much of the work was rote memorization disguised as fun and games: "spelling bees, geography bees, history bees, even multiplication-table bees." In the seventh grade, when Grandpa's family moved to the city, he was shocked at how his no-frills education outshone that of his urban peers. Years later, Grandpa the professor delights in the foundation laid by his old-fashioned beginnings. The watercolor-and-ink illustrations create a solid sense of time and place. This gentle story unfolds nicely, captivating children and raising intriguing questions about the effectiveness of a "country school" education.–Catherine Threadgill, Charleston County Public Library, SC
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

From Booklist

K-Gr. 3. A boy thinks his grandpa is the smartest person in the world, and Grandpa thinks it's because of the country school he went to in the 1940s. There were only three rooms, several grades per room, and no indoor plumbing (though a toilet arrives in the middle of the book). Spelling and history bees, which Grandpa always won, were favorite interludes; then a girl named Kaye came along and beat him out (she became Grandma, but that's another story, he says). The art is bright and winsome, with lively lines sketching figures, buildings, and landscapes washed with color. Words and images paint a vivid picture of country schoolhouse life aside from academics: flies that invaded during summer, trying to make it to the outhouse in the winter. This is obviously heavy on nostalgia, and some may quibble with the underlying message about rote learning; but this is an undeniably engaging look back. GraceAnne DeCandido
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Reading level: Ages 4 and up
  
• Hardcover: 40 pages
• Publisher: Farrar, Straus and Giroux; 1st edition (August 11, 2004)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0374315779
• ISBN-13: 978-0374315771
• Product Dimensions: 9.5 x 0.5 x 0.5 inches
• Shipping Weight: 11.2 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (1 customer review)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #2,840,196 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

For as long as I can remember, drawing was what I did best. I hoped that art school would help me eventually find a way to use this. On the other hand, writing is something I never planned to do. Although I was an enthusiastic and indiscriminate reader from the time I was very young I never thought of writing as an occupation until my five year old daughter had an adventure. On her second day of For kindergarten she got on the wrong bus and went to the wrong school. After she was safe and sound again at home, I thought this would make a great story. And so, THE BUS FUSS was born. It was never published, but I was hooked.
Over the next several years many books followed. My ideas flooded in and came from people I knew. Everything I saw seemed to suggest another story.
RADIO RESCUE is the story of my father's ham radio days in 1920s New York City. My endless interviews with him gave me a window into his life that otherwise would not have been open.
HIROMI'S HANDS is the story of my daughter's childhood Japanese American friend whose father trained her to be a Sushi chef. I met Hiromi as an adorable, shy five year old child and came to know her well over the next eighteen years.
KNOCKIN' ON WOOD is the story of Peg Leg Bates. the one legged dancer. I first saw him on television on the Ed Sullivan show and wrote his story many years later after hearing my daughter's tap teacher talk about the great tappers he knew.
A COUNTRY SCHOOLHOUSE tells the story of my husband's school days in a three room schoolhouse in Dutchess country in the 1940s. I had listened to his amusing anecdotes about this for years and finally wrote them down.
Not all my stories are nonfiction. OLD FRIENDS is the story of an old lady who recognizes her childhood friend in the form of a dog. Sometime after writing this story, much to my surprise, I realized that the old lady was a perfect description of my own grandmother!
Telling stories and making pictures gives me great joy. When words and pictures work well together they form something new, something greater than the sum of its parts. I look forward to bringing many more stories to life in this way.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Wonderful, July 2, 2009

By 

Janis Greener "jmg" (Dover Plains, NY) - See all my reviews

This review is from: A Country Schoolhouse (Hardcover)

Great Book - I gave 2 copies to people that attended this school at about the same time that was depicted in the story. The story took place in Wingdale, NY. They were THRILLED !