Genre: Fiction
Reading Level/Interest Level: 2.2/Grades K-3
Awards: None
Series: Junie B. Jones –Stepping Stone
Similar Titles: Ramona Quimby series by Beverly Cleary
The
crazy and wild Junie B. Jones is back and learning how to make new friends.
When her best friends, Gracie and Lucille, fall head over heels with the new
boy, “Handsome Warren,” she does everything she can to get his attention, only
to be labeled as a nutball. The harder she tries, the crazier she seems, until
she finally settles down to being herself, and really makes a new friend, where
those who were only trying to show off to get Warren’s attention, show that
they weren’t true friends to begin with. Junie B. has no choice in the matter.
She simply knows no other way than to be her usual zany self, which is exactly
what Warren needs when he begins to miss his old school.
The
awkward syntax and wild situations Junie B. gets into, is what really sets
apart the Junie B. Jones series. Kids like these books because they are written
from a Kindergarten, 1st grade and second grade perspective, using
the same syntax errors, situations and social comedies that occur when growing
up. They are real and easy to understand and the reader comes to love Junie B.
for her quirks and her “realness.”
The
Junie books in this series are short and easy to read, with a few black and
white ink drawings, much like the Ramona
Quimby books. Also, like the Ramona Quimby books, while the publisher might
market them to Kindergarteners, I think they are better, as an independent
read, for first and second graders. However, in a group read setting, or read
by a loving adult, Junie is more than adequately appropriate for the
Kindergartener with a longer attention span, who will love the way that Junie
B. finds her way out of the same situations they have found themselves in.
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