Andrew Clements Aladdin Fiction, CH General Fiction Themes: Schools ****
Description
Nick Allen doesn't mean to be a troublemaker; he just gets big ideas and has to try them out. One time, he turned his classroom into a tropical island... which was
great fun until the janitor complained about the sand in the hallway. Then there was the year he learned about the blackbirds and the hawks, how they made a high warning
noise the hawk couldn't pin down - a noise teachers, apparently, also couldn't pin down. But in fifth grade, Nick's supposed to be growing up and getting ready for
middle school.
Then he meets Mrs. Granger, a language arts teacher with a will as strong as his own, and Nick comes up with his greatest idea ever. An assignment to understand the
origins of words leads Nick to invent his own word: "frindle," instead of "pen." He even recruits a few friends to help spread his word. It started as a way to tweak Mrs.
Granger. But the game quickly becomes much larger than Nick anticipated, involving not just him and his teacher but the whole class, the whole school... maybe the whole
nation.
Review
How do words become words - and how do new words appear? This quick-reading story tracks the growth of a new word, as Nick pits the contradictory ideas he's been
given - that the dictionary holds all the words in the English language, and that words only have meaning because everyone agrees they have meaning - against each other,
and against the one teacher who has outsmarted his tricks. Nick really isn't a troublemaker, at least not a malicious one, but one of those clever kids who finds school
boring, one who learned early on how to manipulate teachers because it was more challenging than the lessons, one bold enough to turn classes into real-world laboratories
for his big ideas. He's the kind of kid who can do great things if he's not stomped down by conformist authorities, as they try to stomp Nick down here... the way they
too often are stomped down in real life. It becomes not so much about the word itself but about a battle of wills between student and teacher, between innovation and
tradition. Both end up growing and learning, in a story that's simple on the outside but has some interesting ideas and themes lurking beneath the surface.
Andrew Clements Atheneum Books Fiction, CH General Fiction Themes: Schools, Soldier Stories ****+
Description
Jack Rankin used to be proud of his father... way back when he was in second grade, before he realized that janitors
were considered the lowest of the low. Now, he's stuck in the very school where his father works. Worse, when a
classmate got sick, Dad smiled at him in front of the whole class and said hello to Jack, calling him "son". Of course,
the class bullies latch onto this bit of information in a snap... and it never would've happened if his father had a
better job! This calls for revenge, by way of a massive wad of gum smeared under a desk in the music room: just the way
to send a message to his father about what Jack thinks of janitors in general and him in particular.
Unfortunately, teachers and principals aren't as oblivious as kids would like to believe, at least not when it really
matters. Caught, Jack is sentenced to three weeks of gum cleaning duty after school, which will mean working with his
dad. How much worse could his life get?
But then Jack discovers the janitors' secret: keys that let them access any room in the building. He never expected his
explorations to teach him more about his father, and why the man seems so happy and proud being "just" a school
janitor.
Review
I've only read a few of Clements's books, but the ones I have read have been stellar. He really had a way of
capturing the often-awkward, sometimes-painful moments of growing up, and presenting adults as something more than
monolithic masses even in stories geared around young protagonists. This story is a small slice of a boy's life, but a
pivotal one, as Jack struggles in a vice between peer pressure and family; he never truly hates his father, not at a
bone-deep level at any rate, but feels frustrated and, yes, more than a little ashamed to be known as the janitor's
boy. Sentenced to work with the janitors after school, he learns there's more to them and their jobs than he ever
stopped to think about before, just as he learns that there's more to his father than he ever realized; everything and
everyone has hidden facets, from old school buildings to the people whom he's always taken for granted around him.
Meanwhile, the act of gum-based vandalism/rebellion wakes his father John up to the fact that Jack isn't a little kid
anymore, and that a growing boy needs more to hold onto if there's going to be a relationship in the future. John
finally brings the boy into his confidence about some of the forces that shaped him, including his own stressful
relationship with Jack's late grandfather. It culminates in a rite of passage that's both a literal and metaphoric
journey out of young childhood and young childish emotions and viewpoints and into something more mature and
nuanced.
The Things Not Seen series, Book 1 Andrew Clements Puffin Fiction, YA Sci-Fi Themes: Altered DNA *****
Description
Fifteen-year-old Bobby is a typical teen, until the morning he wakes up to discover he’s invisible. It’s not just that his parents don’t notice him, though as a college
professor and top physicist they sometimes get preoccupied with their work. He’s really invisible, as in he can’t see his own face in the mirror. Suddenly, Bobby finds
himself a ghost in his own home, as he can’t go to the school or even the library without a visible body. He can’t even talk to his friends or see a doctor, for fear that
the wrong people could take an interest in his unusual case. While his mother worries and his father tries to determine what happened (with little success, but lots of
theories), Bobby begins to explore life as the ultimate hidden observer. But a child just can’t vanish for weeks on end without someone getting suspicious; unless Bobby
wants to see his family carted off to jail, he’s going to have to figure out what caused his invisibility - and if it can be reversed.
Review
A fast, good read that creates surprisingly believable characters, Things Not Seen is less about why a boy could become invisible and more about how people deal
with a seemingly impossible phenomenon. It goes without saying that Bobby has to do some growing up along the way, especially when he meets the blind girl Alicia and learns
that not only is he not alone in being alone, but that even his slim chance of restoration to “normal” is more than many people have. I loved it, and stayed up well past
midnight to finish reading.
For over a decade, the highlight of the fifth grade year at Hardy Elementary has been A Week in the Woods, five days
and nights camping out in a national forest and learning about the natural world. Mr. Maxwell, the science teacher, is
the organizer and greatest proponent of the outing, being an avid woodsman and environmentalist. He loves sharing his
passion for the wilderness with young minds, always eager to learn... but one thing he cannot stand is slackers, or
spoiled, entitled, wealthy kids whose families make their money off destroying the planet. So it was inevitable that
he'd take a dislike to the new kid in his class, Mark Chelmsley (the Fourth). The boy's parents spent more renovating a
local historic farm house and acreage than the entire town sees in a year, and the kid himself is every bit as
disengaged and even snotty as one would expect from a wealthy boy "slumming" with commoners. A kid like that might even
ruin A Week in the Woods - and Mr. Maxwell is determined not to let that happen.
Mark is tired of bouncing around the world from house to house, his parents gone on business trips more often than not.
He loves his caretakers, and isn't neglected by any means, but he misses Mom and Dad and doesn't really feel attached
to anyone or anywhere... until he arrives in the Chelmsleys' latest home in New Hampshire. The wooded hills seem to
call to him, and he develops a love of the land beyond anything he's experienced before. The only real drawback is his
school - a public school, for the first time in his life - and the science teacher Mr. Maxwell. The man seems to
dislike him from the start, the two developing a rivalry that only barely stays civil. But when Mr. Maxwell lets his
grudge go too far, Mark finally snaps. He sets out to prove himself to the teacher and everyone... never expecting
things to go so wrong.
Review
Many children's books reduce adults to caricatures, mere obstacles that must be either avoided or overcome by the
young protagonists. Clements never cheapens his stories like that. Here, both Mr. Maxwell and young Mark are well
rounded, with clear roots and motivations for their behavior and their rivalry. The science teacher comes from a love
of both teaching and the environment, and has seen what entitled people do to the planet... and what an unmotivated,
slacker student can do to a classroom. Mark, meanwhile, has been told time and again that his brief foray in public
school is a chance to relax; it won't really count, after all, for a boy already assured entry into an elite private
boarding school, and besides his own schools covered most of the curriculum at least a year or two before so it's all
old news. His disengagement masks a loneliness even the boy doesn't quite acknowledge, but which comes across to Mr.
Maxwell as something else entirely. When young Mark discovers his own love of the woods, this could be a means to
connect with the standoffish teacher, especially when he realizes himself how his attitude is contributing to his
social isolation and he tries to change, but by then the faculty has made up its mind, especially Mr. Maxwell, who
only digs in harder as the boy tries to establish a truce. It all culminates in the promised school camping trip,
where Mr. Maxwell leaps to a conclusion and harsh judgement and pushes Mark too far. Given that the title and blurb
center this camping trip as a main plot point, it feels like Clements drags his feet in getting there, wandering
through backstory and Mark's earlier excursions into the woods on his family's property as he builds confidence and
skills (helped by one of his caretakers, who has experience camping from his childhood in Russia). That said, the
story does a decent job letting both Mark and Mr. Maxwell earn their lessons (it's not just the child who has
something to learn, here). Despite the slower, wandering start, its portrayal of a boy's sense of wonder as he
discovers a new world outdoors, how easily miscommunication between teachers and students can start, and the lasting
ramifications of classroom grudges rings true.
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