Gooney Bird Greene has a fabulous idea after her teacher reads fables to the class. The children learn that fables are stories with animal characters that teach something important. Gooney’s fabulous idea is that each student create their own fable and tell it to the class! Everyone but Nicholas is excited about their stories and costumes. Can Gooney Bird find out why Nicholas is unhappy and get him to join in the fun? Now that would be truly fabulous!
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Book Description
Editorial Reviews
From School Library Journal
Grade 1–3—Gooney Bird Greene returns for a third installment. Here, her second-grade class is learning about fables. In typical Gooney fashion, the precocious child takes over her classroom by suggesting that everyone write a new fable. Mrs. Pidgeon encourages her enthusiasm by letting her direct the project, and each subsequent chapter is dedicated to a student's work, including one fable about a T. rex done as a rap, concluding with, "Big mean nuthin' if you don't do school!" Given the age of these children, they are amazingly adept at writing, reading, and giving presentations, and they run into only minor glitches with their fables. While it is refreshing to hear from the other members of the class so clearly dominated by Gooney Bird, their creations lack the zest that hers usually have. Fortunately, her eccentric outfits and words of wisdom are peppered throughout to keep the story moving along while Thomas's characteristic black-and-white illustrations provide nice visuals. Full of new vocabulary words and information about fables, this slightly didactic first chapter book is a must for Gooney Bird fans.—Julie Roach, Cambridge Public Library, MA
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved. --This text refers to the Hardcover edition.
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved. --This text refers to the Hardcover edition.
From Booklist
Second-grader Gooney Bird Green returns in this story with a moral. After Miss Pidgeon reads her class an Aesop's fable, the kids write their own stories with a message. As in previous books, Gooney takes the lead, as much of a junior teacher as she is kid. The recitation of five or six original fables becomes a bit boring, but Lowry nicely individualizes her characters and gets readers interested in their problems. It will take good primary-grade readers to tackle this; it may work best as a read-aloud. Ilene Cooper
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved --This text refers to the Hardcover edition.
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved --This text refers to the Hardcover edition.
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More About the Author
Lois Lowry is known for her versatility and invention as a writer. She was born in Hawaii and grew up in New York, Pennsylvania, and Japan. After several years at Brown University, she turned to her family and to writing. She is the author of more than thirty books for young adults, including the popular Anastasia Krupnik series. She has received countless honors, among them the Boston Globe-Horn Book Award, the Dorothy Canfield Fisher Award, the California Young Reader.s Medal, and the Mark Twain Award. She received Newbery Medals for two of her novels, NUMBER THE STARS and THE GIVER. Her first novel, A SUMMER TO DIE, was awarded the International Reading Association.s Children.s Book Award. Ms. Lowry now divides her time between Cambridge and an 1840s farmhouse in Maine. To learn more about Lois Lowry, see her website at www.loislowry.com
author interview
A CONVERSATION WITH LOIS LOWRY ABOUT THE GIVER
Q. When did you know you wanted to become a writer?
A. I cannot remember ever not wanting to be a writer.
Q. What inspired you to write The Giver?
A. Kids always ask what inspired me to write a particular book or how did I get an idea for a particular book, and often it's very easy to answer that because books like the Anastasia books come from a specific thing; some little event triggers an idea. But a book like The Giver is a much more complicated book, and therefore it comes from much more complicated places--and many of them are probably things that I don't even recognize myself anymore, if I ever did. So it's not an easy question to answer.
I will say that the whole concept of memory is one that interests me a great deal. I'm not sure why that is, but I've always been fascinated by the thought of what memory is and what it does and how it works and what we learn from it. And so I think probably that interest of my own and that particular subject was the origin, one of many, of The Giver.
Q. How did you decide what Jonas should take on his journey?
A. Why does Jonas take what he does on his journey? He doesn't have much time when he sets out. He originally plans to make the trip farther along in time, and he plans to prepare for it better. But then, because of circumstances, he has to set out in a very hasty fashion. So what he chooses is out of necessity. He takes food because he needs to survive. He takes the bicycle because he needs to hurry and the bike is faster than legs. And he takes the baby because he is going out to create a future. And babies always represent the future in the same way children represent the future to adults. And so Jonas takes the baby so the baby's life will be saved, but he takes the baby also in order to begin again with a new life.
Q. When you wrote the ending, were you afraid some readers would want more details or did you want to leave the ending open to individual interpretation?
A. Many kids want a more specific ending to The Giver. Some write, or ask me when they see me, to spell it out exactly. And I don't do that. And the reason is because The Giver is many things to many different people. People bring to it their own complicated beliefs and hopes and dreams and fears and all of that. So I don't want to put my own feelings into it, my own beliefs, and ruin that for people who create their own endings in their minds.
Q. Is it an optimistic ending? Does Jonas survive?
A. I will say that I find it an optimistic ending. How could it not be an optimistic ending, a happy ending, when that house is there with its lights on and music is playing? So I'm always kind of surprised and disappointed when some people tell me that they think the boy and the baby just die. I don't think they die. What form their new life takes is something I like people to figure out for themselves. And each person will give it a different ending. I think they're out there somewhere and I think that their life has changed and their life is happy, and I would like to think that's true for the people they left behind as well.
Q. In what way is your book Gathering Blue a companion to The Giver?
A. Gathering Blue postulates a world of the future, as The Giver does. I simply created a different kind of world, one that had regressed instead of leaping forward technologically as the world of The Giver has. It was fascinating to explore the savagery of such a world. I began to feel that maybe it coexisted with Jonas's world . . . and that therefore Jonas could be a part of it in a tangential way. So there is a reference to a boy with light eyes at the end of Gathering Blue. He can be Jonas or not, as you wish.
author interview
A CONVERSATION WITH LOIS LOWRY ABOUT THE GIVER
Q. When did you know you wanted to become a writer?
A. I cannot remember ever not wanting to be a writer.
Q. What inspired you to write The Giver?
A. Kids always ask what inspired me to write a particular book or how did I get an idea for a particular book, and often it's very easy to answer that because books like the Anastasia books come from a specific thing; some little event triggers an idea. But a book like The Giver is a much more complicated book, and therefore it comes from much more complicated places--and many of them are probably things that I don't even recognize myself anymore, if I ever did. So it's not an easy question to answer.
I will say that the whole concept of memory is one that interests me a great deal. I'm not sure why that is, but I've always been fascinated by the thought of what memory is and what it does and how it works and what we learn from it. And so I think probably that interest of my own and that particular subject was the origin, one of many, of The Giver.
Q. How did you decide what Jonas should take on his journey?
A. Why does Jonas take what he does on his journey? He doesn't have much time when he sets out. He originally plans to make the trip farther along in time, and he plans to prepare for it better. But then, because of circumstances, he has to set out in a very hasty fashion. So what he chooses is out of necessity. He takes food because he needs to survive. He takes the bicycle because he needs to hurry and the bike is faster than legs. And he takes the baby because he is going out to create a future. And babies always represent the future in the same way children represent the future to adults. And so Jonas takes the baby so the baby's life will be saved, but he takes the baby also in order to begin again with a new life.
Q. When you wrote the ending, were you afraid some readers would want more details or did you want to leave the ending open to individual interpretation?
A. Many kids want a more specific ending to The Giver. Some write, or ask me when they see me, to spell it out exactly. And I don't do that. And the reason is because The Giver is many things to many different people. People bring to it their own complicated beliefs and hopes and dreams and fears and all of that. So I don't want to put my own feelings into it, my own beliefs, and ruin that for people who create their own endings in their minds.
Q. Is it an optimistic ending? Does Jonas survive?
A. I will say that I find it an optimistic ending. How could it not be an optimistic ending, a happy ending, when that house is there with its lights on and music is playing? So I'm always kind of surprised and disappointed when some people tell me that they think the boy and the baby just die. I don't think they die. What form their new life takes is something I like people to figure out for themselves. And each person will give it a different ending. I think they're out there somewhere and I think that their life has changed and their life is happy, and I would like to think that's true for the people they left behind as well.
Q. In what way is your book Gathering Blue a companion to The Giver?
A. Gathering Blue postulates a world of the future, as The Giver does. I simply created a different kind of world, one that had regressed instead of leaping forward technologically as the world of The Giver has. It was fascinating to explore the savagery of such a world. I began to feel that maybe it coexisted with Jonas's world . . . and that therefore Jonas could be a part of it in a tangential way. So there is a reference to a boy with light eyes at the end of Gathering Blue. He can be Jonas or not, as you wish.
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Most Helpful Customer Reviews
7 of 8 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Latest Gooney story of a win-win girl's ideas.,
By Midwest Book Review (Oregon, WI USA) - See all my reviews
This review is from: Gooney the Fabulous (Gooney Bird) (Hardcover)
Lois Lowery's GOONEY THE FABULOUS presents grades 2-5 with a fine easy reader telling of Mrs. Pidgeon, who has been reading fables to her second grade class. But Gooney Greene isn't content with hearing fables: what if each child creates his or her own fable and tells it to the class? Her idea sparks interest and new challenges in this latest Gooney story of a win-win girl's ideas.
5.0 out of 5 stars
Pipi Longstocking of today,
By Windswept (Long Valley, NJ) - See all my reviews
Amazon Verified Purchase(What's this?)
This review is from: Gooney the Fabulous (Gooney Bird) (Paperback)
I wish my daughter's best friend was Gooney Bird Greene because she would always be having an adventure doing everyday stuff. I read this book and it's sequel to my 4 year-old-daughter, and being a former teacher, found the characters were very realistic. It has good messages, teaching moments and is fun to read.
0 of 2 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
She is truly fabulous,
By
This review is from: Gooney the Fabulous (Gooney Bird) (Paperback)
When I first selected the "Gooney Bird" series I knew it would be cute since I used Amazon's previous service, but little did I realize that even this 58-year-old Nana would derive so much pleasure for myself.
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Gooney Bird, Felicia Ann, Barry Tuckerman, United States, Abe Lincoln, Saint Bernard Browse Sample Pages:
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Gooney Bird, Felicia Ann, Barry Tuckerman, United States, Abe Lincoln, Saint Bernard Browse Sample Pages:
Front Cover | Front Flap | First Pages | Back Flap | Back Cover | Surprise Me!
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