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A review by nahyee
Fish In A Tree by Lynda Mullaly Hunt
5.0
Making the Impossible Possible
"Fish in a Tree" was another book that I read because my daughter is reading it for school. The book is a quick and excellent read. It's easy to identify at the beginning that Ally Nickerson has dyslexia, even without reading the description of the book. For those reviewers who called it "predictable," it's important to keep in mind that the book is targeted at grades 5-8. The daughter of a father in the military, Ally changes schools a lot, so she has never been diagnosed and displays classic avoidance techniques when it comes to assignments that require reading or writing. She is disruptive and gets sent to the office a lot. When her regular sixth-grade teacher goes out on maternity leave, her substitute is the one who recognizes the challenges Ally is facing. He doesn't let her get away with her avoidance and works with her to overcome the challenges of not being able to learn the way the other students do. He makes her realize that she is not dumb, which is what she wholeheartedly believes, and makes her realize that she wants to do well.
Throughout the book, we see Ally blossom in her ability and in her confidence -- going from thinking that it's impossible for her to read and write to seeing what is possible for her. We see her relationships with her classmates change, and we see the difference that a great teacher can make for a child. There are also plenty of examples of how children treat each other in school when they're away from their parents -- good, bad, and indifferent.
Everyone can take a lesson from this story, and it should be on every parent's reading list.
"Fish in a Tree" was another book that I read because my daughter is reading it for school. The book is a quick and excellent read. It's easy to identify at the beginning that Ally Nickerson has dyslexia, even without reading the description of the book. For those reviewers who called it "predictable," it's important to keep in mind that the book is targeted at grades 5-8. The daughter of a father in the military, Ally changes schools a lot, so she has never been diagnosed and displays classic avoidance techniques when it comes to assignments that require reading or writing. She is disruptive and gets sent to the office a lot. When her regular sixth-grade teacher goes out on maternity leave, her substitute is the one who recognizes the challenges Ally is facing. He doesn't let her get away with her avoidance and works with her to overcome the challenges of not being able to learn the way the other students do. He makes her realize that she is not dumb, which is what she wholeheartedly believes, and makes her realize that she wants to do well.
Throughout the book, we see Ally blossom in her ability and in her confidence -- going from thinking that it's impossible for her to read and write to seeing what is possible for her. We see her relationships with her classmates change, and we see the difference that a great teacher can make for a child. There are also plenty of examples of how children treat each other in school when they're away from their parents -- good, bad, and indifferent.
Everyone can take a lesson from this story, and it should be on every parent's reading list.