Take a photo of a barcode or cover
5 reviews for:
Balto and the Great Race (Totally True Adventures): How a Sled Dog Saved the Children of Nome
Elizabeth Cody Kimmel
4.09 AVERAGE
5 reviews for:
Balto and the Great Race (Totally True Adventures): How a Sled Dog Saved the Children of Nome
Elizabeth Cody Kimmel
4.09 AVERAGE
adventurous
hopeful
informative
inspiring
tense
fast-paced
A love, stirring account of the famous trek 1926, in which dog sled teams brought diphtheria antitoxin from one end of Alaska to the other to save a whole village of sick people. This is the basis of the Iditarod. It's also a wonderful celebration of the dogs who worked so bravely and so hard to make their way through blizzards, treaties well below zero and hazardous cracking ice underfoot. The bond between people and dogs is a mysterious and inspiring thing, and this story brings it home to young readers. The book is aimed at grades 1-3; but some of the ideas and the vocabulary felt a bit more sophisticated, more like grades 2-4 to me. Still, I hardly ever enjoy books for this age (I tend to prefer picture books or older middle grade books by far); I think it's awfully hard to do so well. Really nice.
adventurous
inspiring
fast-paced
I read this with my 2nd graders who adored learning about Balto. The Totally True Adventure books are packed with facts and are a great way to introduce nonfiction subjects in an engaging manner. The kids and I all learned so much about the landscape of Alaska and the history of dog sledding. This text inspired a lot of insightful discussions and made the kids want to read more Totally True Adventure books.
adventurous
inspiring
tense
fast-paced
Positive:
- good hook
- the author successfully creates tension without making the book too scary for young children
- while the book only briefly mentions the Inuits, it does so without whitewashing history, noting that Inuits were disproportionately affected by the diphtheria epidemic because their immune systems had no resistance to diseases brought over by Europeans in the 1700s.
- sentence structure is short and uncomplicated but includes sophisticated vocabulary
Problematic:
- Balto's personification felt a little jarring as an adult (p. 60, "He remembered what they had left behind in that town and why they needed to return"). Not sure if a child reading the book would respond similarly.
- good hook
- the author successfully creates tension without making the book too scary for young children
- while the book only briefly mentions the Inuits, it does so without whitewashing history, noting that Inuits were disproportionately affected by the diphtheria epidemic because their immune systems had no resistance to diseases brought over by Europeans in the 1700s.
- sentence structure is short and uncomplicated but includes sophisticated vocabulary
Problematic:
- Balto's personification felt a little jarring as an adult (p. 60, "He remembered what they had left behind in that town and why they needed to return"). Not sure if a child reading the book would respond similarly.