Boxes for Katje - Historical Fiction

Historical Fiction

Title: Boxes for Katje
Author: Candace Fleming
Illustrator: Stacey Dressen-McQueen
Publisher: Farrar, Straus, and Giroux
Copyright: 2003
# of Pages: 40
Genre: Fiction

     Boxes for Katje is a wonderful story about pen pals. Katje is from Holland and Rosie is from America. Katje and her family have just survived WWII and is now scraping to get by. Katje and her family have to patch their clothes as best they can and go without several everyday items. Rosie sends a box to Katje who she has never met filled with a sock, soap, and chocolate. The girls start writing back and forth to eat other, and every time Rosie sends a box the box gets bigger and bigger filled with more items to not only help Katje's family but also the town.

     The illustrations by Stacey Dressen-McQueen are vintage looking. The characters show emotions of excitement to disappointment. Stacey uses lots of color. Some parts of the illustrations are painted, cut-outs glued on, and paper showing the letters. Stacey uses a lot of layers to the illustrations always giving the reader more to look at. The layers of the illustrations also parallel to the story having many layers of hidden lessons to learn.

     Content Area and Grade: Social Studies - 3rd Grade
I would read this book when I have taught on WWII to show another perspective of the effects of war. I would have the students compare/contrast what Katje's family in Holland had to what the students in the class have today.
For a student that is gifted, I would have them to research ways to help victims today and come up with a project to help victims of war. Or I would have them do more research on the effects of WWII on European countries. Because this work is more extensive, I would pair up the student that is gifted in a group with the students who are also doing well in the class. I would make sure the student did an equal amount of work to the other students.