Customer Reviews

Flute's Journey: The Life of a Wood Thrush

5 star:		(5)
4 star:		(0)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

When I began writing Flute's Journey, I was going to put Flute in the woods at the Smithsonian Environmental Research Center where I was then artist-in-residence. However, an ornithologist friend said, "put Flute in the Belt Woods!" "What's the Belt woods?" I asked. She told me it was a forest that had been owned by Seton Belt and he had willed it to a church if they agreed to never cut the trees or sell the land. But after he died, the church had the will overturned and put the land up for sale to a developer for $9 million. It's a long story, but many children wrote letters to the bishop of the church asking that they respect Seton Belt's wishes and save the land. And, I'm convinced, that it was their letters that saved Flute's home, the Belt woods. Their letters, like the following one, came from the heart: "Seton Belt trusted you. How can you go against him?" Our campaign to save the woods was covered by CBS Morning News with Charles Osgood and they mentioned Flute's Journey and the children's letters. They asked me what kids could do. I said, "they can write to the church." And so many more letters were sent. Now Belt Woods is preserved forever. Children helped to save Flute's home and children, in many ways, can make a difference in the world. Lynne Cherry

As a fifth grade science teacher in Texas, one of our objectives is for students to understand the difference between learned and inherited behaviors. Flute's Journey accomplishes this goal beautifully. From the beautiful illustrations to the lyrical text, the students are drawn in to the life of a woodthrush. As I read the book to them, they were to write down in one column the learned traits they saw/heard, and the inherited traits in another. They were enthralled with the story, and were amazed at how many examples there were in this one book of each type of behavior. Even though this book is listed for the lower primary grades, I highly recommend it for any science class studying learned and instinctual behaviors.

It tells how hard the life of birds can be. I especially liked how it told about the cowbird who came and took one egg away because that tells the way cowbirds are. I liked how the children gaves names to the woodthrushes.

This is a beautiful book! It provides ecological information that a child can understand. It has a strong message and is entertaining as well as educational. It has beatiful watercolor paintings and a compelling storyline. Enjoyable for parents and children.

This is an amazing book for kids. Along with an interesting and real life story it has amazing pictures to follow along with. I am particularly a fan of the book's truthful nature and not sugar coating the story for kids!

I hate to be the dissenting voice because of the nasty hate mail that seems to follow a negative review, but this story is beautifully written propaganda.

I so much wanted to like this book, and on a surface level, I did. Thus the three stars instead of one or two. My kids and I were doing a unit on birds and birdwatching, and this book was highly recommended by a homeschool curriculum we like. The plot is wonderful--about a little wood thrush's adventures as he migrates South for the Winter and then home again. My kids enjoyed this story, and I appreciated how the author wove in mini-lessons on seasons, climate, and geography. And the illustrations are beautiful.

BUT. It does not take an overly astute adult to pick up on the environmentalist message throughout the book. For example, there is a comment about how suburbanization hurt Flute because the developing houses had changed the landscape, and it was hard for him to find his yard. Is the authors suggesting that mankind not build homes so that migrating birds can find their way home better? There were also the familiar swats at mankind concerning deforestation, etc throughout.

It would have been a perfect book without these touches, which of course were intentional by the author. According to her own review here, a church went back on their word and inspired the story. Thus the agenda in this book--which, in my opinion, is unnecessary to teach young readers about migration.