Dart, Arrow, and Boomerang: Feb. 2021
There are big ideas brewing in this month’s Dart, Arrow, and Boomerang guides!
While we discuss mechanics and literary devices, we’ll also experience the power of stories. We’ll read tales of:
- loss,
- love,
- resilience,
- and learning.
We’ll notice how stories shape and shift the way we think and help us to understand the world in wondrous new ways.
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Sarah, Plain and Tall, Patricia MacLachlan
Set in the late nineteenth century and told from young Anna’s point of view, Sarah, Plain and Tall tells the story of how Sarah Elisabeth Wheaton comes from Maine to the prairie to answer Papa’s advertisement for a wife and mother. Before Sarah arrives, Anna and her younger brother Caleb wait and wonder. Will Sarah be nice? Will she sing? Will she stay?
This children’s literature classic is perfect for fans of Laura Ingalls Wilder’s Little House on the Prairie books, historical fiction, and timeless stories using rich and beautiful language. Sarah, Plain and Tall gently explores themes of abandonment, loss and love. ~Amazon
Get the Dart.
Purchase the novel here.
The People Could Fly, Virginia Hamilton
The well-known author retells 24 black American folk tales in sure storytelling voice: animal tales, supernatural tales, fanciful and cautionary tales, and slave tales of freedom. All are beautifully readable. With the added attraction of 40 wonderfully expressive paintings by the Dillons, this collection should be snapped up. ~School Library Journal
Note: Purchase or borrow the collection of folk tales, not the picture book version.
Get the Arrow.
Purchase the novel here.
Blink, Malcolm Gladwell
In Blink we meet the psychologist who has learned to predict whether a marriage will last, based on a few minutes of observing a couple; the tennis coach who knows when a player will double-fault before the racket even makes contact with the ball; the antiquities experts who recognize a fake at a glance...Blink reveals that great decision makers aren’t those who process the most information or spend the most time deliberating, but those who have perfected the art of “thin-slicing”, filtering the very few factors that matter from an overwhelming number of variables.
Drawing on cutting-edge neuroscience and psychology and displaying all of the brilliance that made The Tipping Point a classic, Blink changes the way you understand every decision you make. Never again will you think about thinking the same way. ~Amazon
Get the Boomerang.
Purchase the novel here.
