Chapter Book: Historical Fiction
Giff, P. (2010). Storyteller. New York, NY: Random House Children's Books.
The book, Storyteller, is a great book about young girls finding their strength during touch times. The book is split between two different characters, Zee and Elizabeth. Zee is a young girl who lives on a farm during the Revolutionary War. Elizabeth, descendant of Zee, is forced to live with her aunt for a few months while her grandfather is out of town. While at her aunt's house, she discovers a lot about herself and her history, including Zee. Both girls show a sense of perseverance and curiosity throughout the book, making them both strong, female characters.
With this story being historical fiction, there are a lot of different avenues you could take this to teach to an elementary classroom. Since the story is taking place during the Revolutionary War and several Generals and Forts are named in the story, students could do additional research of the war and places that were mentioned in the story. Additionally, the story talks a lot about family history and discovering not only who your ancestors are but what they did. Educators could lead family-tree oriented research projects where students are researching themselves! This book is on 4th grade reading level so it may be best to have this in a literature circle group or as a class, depending on the grade and reading level of your students.