Book Review: Juliana

Disclaimer: This is an unsolicited review. I purchased my own books and the link at the bottom provides me ZERO compensation.

Reviews (via my students):

Storyline: 3.9/5 “It was a good story. I understood pretty much all of it. Because it was easy the story is kind of simple. But SUPER interesting. I Googled to see if some of it was true. I learned a lot about bats even though that wasn’t the point.”- 6th grade student, Novice-Mid ish

“I really like how Juliana is just herself, like nobody is going to stop her. She still did some dumb stuff which I can relate. You do you, Juliana. You do you.” -7th grade student, Novice-High ish

“My favorite class is science and I got to do that here. So awesome. The book was mostly easy to read. I really liked how it’s based on a true story, like movies.” -6th grade student, Novice-Mid ish

Classroom Function (my opinion):

FVR Potential: This novel is an FVR favorite in my classroom. My students feel confident reading it which is much more important to me than having the best storyline on the planet. My fast finishers like to pick this up and then see what’s true and what’s not (albino bats? animal tunnels? Family groups among bats?).

My recommendation is to buy a minimum of 5. Students can support each other and discuss content. My original single reader was the source of some middle school drama.

Whole Class Potential: I love this story, I don’t think I could teach it whole class. I do think this novel has excellent potential for small group or café style readings.

I have a few reasons for being hesitant to teach this as a whole class novel. 1) My students call me (affectionately?) the Crazy Charades Lady when we read as a whole class. My arms aren’t in-shape enough to be a bat. 2) There are beautiful illustrations in every chapter. I find students rely heavily on the pictures instead of listening and following along for acquisition. 3) My knowledge of bat culture is limited to the kind that hang around Robins. 4) I really want to work on an interdisciplinary unit with our science teachers to increase background for this story, and the curriculum doesn’t line-up in a non-forced way.

I think this book would be great when teaching in café style, or literature circles. It would be a great for students too advanced for Capibara but not quite ready for Tumba. The visual cues from the amazing illustrations would provide scaffolds for advanced students needing to reach up or even for struggling students in a second year class.

Summary: Buy the book. It is worth it! Here is the Amazon link.