Middle Grade Monday: The Unteachables by Gordon Korman

Image: HarperCollins Publishers

The Unteachables by Gordon Korman. Unabridged e-audiobook, ~6 hours. Narrated by a full cast. Balzar + Bray/ HarperAudio, January, 2019. 9780062885289. (Review of e-audiobook borrowed from public library. Own the hc.)

Middle Grade Monday features The Unteachables by Gordon Korman. What happens when a burnt out teacher, who is basically phoning it in until early retirement is assigned to Room 117 by a superintendent who wants the guy gone? Room 117 houses "the unteachables." All are academic failures for one reason or another. Gordon Korman takes the improbable and makes it both humorous and (somewhat) believable. His fans will not be disappointed.

I was a bit though. Admittedly, I am not the intended audience. I felt the premise was a bit shaky and the adults tended toward cardboard stereotypes. 

Words with Wings by Nikki Grimes

84 p. Wordsong/ Boyds Mills Press, September, 2013. 9781590789858. (Finished copy courtesy of publisher)

Gabby is a daydreamer, like her father. She never knows what will send her tripping into her daydream world, but she finds refuge in it when her parents' fighting escalates. When they divorce and she and her mom move and she starts a new school, she finds she is happier there than where she should be:

To these kids,/ I'm not Gabby yet./ I'm just Shy Girl/ Who lives/ Inside Her Head.

Living with just her mother now seems to intensify the scrutiny, especially as Gabby realizes that being so much like her father probably displeases her mother.

Favorite Words

Mine: Pretend.
Mom's: Practical.
All we have in common
is the letter P.

Gabby likes her new teacher but is embarrassed about being called out about her daydreaming. So she puts them away and does her best to be in this world. Only it gets her down and after a while Mr. Spicer notices and asks to have his daydreamer back. He promises that if she try to focus during lessons, he will build some daydreaming time into class each day. It is this gift as well as the discovery of a like-minded potential friend that lifts Gabby's spirits.

Four weeks have passed/ and my notebook is thick/ with daydreams./ Funny how much better/ I'm doing in school./

Words with Wings is spare and lovely and filled with moving and poignant moments. It would make a perfect read-aloud in that it is rather brief but very powerful, apt to spark some interesting class discussion and/ or reflection, and could be used as inspiration for a writing unit.

Highly recommended. This is another 2013 favorite.