Customer Reviews

George Washington's Mother (All-Aboard Reading, Level 3)

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

 

 

Poor George ! This book really surprised me. Is this based on facts? Good lesson on contentment. We should all count our blessings, daily. Mrs. Washington had many, yet she was blind to them.I WOULD STILL BUY THIS AS A GOOD EXAMPLE OF CHARACTER TRAITS.

I really appreciated this book. It shows that we are all human and even George Washington had a clingy dependent mother. Whatever flaws he had in his own personality and flaws in his relations, he still found himself being able to cope and acheive. That's a great message to send to readers. It also highlights the dependency women had on men. George Washington's mother was not able to support herself and believed she could not cope.

I am a fan of Jean Fritz, but I was disappointed with this book. It portrays Mrs. Washington in a very bad light, selfish, and greedy. While this may be true, I don't feel it is appropriate for this age level. Children this age should be taught to respect adults. If what Jean Fritz wrote about Mrs. Washington is true then I don't mind my children learning about it...when they are a bit older. Although this book was a disappointment, I do recommend other Fritz books such as George Wahington's Breakfast, and Shh! We're writing the Constitution.

Not only is this book's central theme the negativity of Mary Washington, but it includes a graphic illustration of George Washington being hanged, which is over the top for a children's book (a daydream from Mary, who is constantly worried about George being hurt on the battlefield or by the British). Toward the end of the book you get the impression that Mary Washington was mentally unstable. The book had zero value and, as other reviewers have mentioned, has some grammatical problems to boot. This is a terrible book. It's inappropriate for children and has no value at any age level.

As a teacher, I was very disappointed that a noted author would have such poor writing skills. There are so many sentence fragments in this story, I lost count. I do not know how many times I have to tell students to not start sentences with the word "and". This story has sentences that start with the word "and", and sentences that are just prepositional phrases. It is hard to teach students to write, when authors write poorly.