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Summary
Summary
Gooney Bird Greene knows exactly where she likes to be: "right smack in the middle of everything." Sure enough, her colorful fashion sense, exuberant personality, and "absolutely true" stories land her at the center of attention most of the time, but as Mrs. Pidgeon's second grade class prepares for their Thanksgiving pageant, the lead role of Squanto is still up for grabs. And so is the role of Room Mother, but with each of the children's parents alreadyoverloaded, there are no volunteers to bring cupcakes to their play. So Gooney Bird promises to find one--in exchange for the lead. There's just one catch: the person she convinces to be Room Mother insists on remaining incognito. As the class struggles to decorate the mural, make costumes, and learn their songs for the play, the suspense builds: will the pageant be a success? And who is their mysterious Room Mother?
Two-time Newbery Award-winning author Lois Lowry has once again captured the eager energy of an elementary school classroom and the hilarious antics and anecdotes of its students, especially those of the irrepressible Gooney Bird Greene herself. In her second literary appearance, Gooney Bird is back with more "absolutely true" stories to tell, more tips for her fellow aspiring storytellers, and a few challenging vocabulary words to share, too.
Author Notes
Lois Lowry is the author of more than forty books for children and young adults, including the New York Times bestselling Giver Quartet and popular Anastasia Krupnik series. She has received countless honors, among them the Boston Globe-Horn Book Award, the Dorothy Canfield Fisher Award, the California Young Reader's Medal, and the Mark Twain Award. She received Newbery Medals for two of her novels, Number the Stars and The Giver . Her first novel, A Summer to Die , was awarded the International Reading Association's Children's Book Award. Ms. Lowry lives in Maine.
www. loislowry.com
Twitter @LoisLowryWriter Middy Thomas is a native Mainer. She loves all forms of art and works in all mediums, from painting to printing to sculpture. Ms. Thomas also teaches two art classes a week in her studio."
Reviews (5)
Publisher's Weekly Review
With her introduction in Gooney Bird Greene, PW predicted that "youngsters will likely hope that the heroine has enough tales stored in her fertile imagination to fill another volume." Well, here it is! Gooney Bird and the Room Mother by Lois Lowry, illus. by Middy Thomas, finds the second-grader-with the impressive vocabulary who brims with "absolutely true" stories-recruiting a Room Mother whose identity remains a mystery. (c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved
Horn Book Review
Mrs. Pidgeon promises the lead role in the second-grade Thanksgiving play to the student who can find a room mother for their classroom. Gooney Bird Greene announces that she has found a room mother, although her surprising identity is not revealed until the day of the play. This second, gently humorous story about the idiosyncratic Gooney Bird is illustrated with so-so black-and-white drawings. (c) Copyright 2010. The Horn Book, Inc., a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted. All rights reserved.
Booklist Review
Gr. 2-4. The lively hero of the chapter book Gooney Bird Greene (2002) is back in her idyllic second-grade classroom, as the children get ready to celebrate a pageant of the First Thanksgiving. Dressed in various exuberant outfits, Gooney is in charge, and she even shows her wonderful teacher a thing or two. Gooney Bird's focus is on the wonder of words--from cajole and ennui to fiasco. Her special word is incognito, because she has arranged to get a room mother for the class, whose identity must be kept secret until the day of the pageant. Relaxed black-and-white illustrations capture the diverse classroom. The lessons are fun (including the history of Squanto), as are the classroom characters. Best of all is the story, which builds to a tense, beautiful climax as the identity of the room mother is revealed. --Hazel Rochman Copyright 2005 Booklist
School Library Journal Review
Gr 1-3-Gooney Bird likes to be "right smack in the middle of everything" in Mrs. Pidgeon's second-grade class. The children are preparing for the Thanksgiving pageant (with Indians in feather headbands) and they are in desperate need of a room mother as all of the parents have refused. When Mrs. Pidgeon decides that the lead role of Squanto will go to the student who can come up with one, Gooney Bird comes to the rescue. She tells the class the story of how she convinced someone to take the job. The only catch is that this person wants to remain incognito until the big day. In Gooney Bird Greene (Houghton, 2002), Lowry used Gooney Bird's stories to introduce the different elements of storytelling. The focus in this sequel is the meaning of words. Whenever a difficult word such as "incognito" is introduced, the children are sent to their dictionaries to look it up. This technique flows well within the story, which is told mostly through dialogue. This is a fast-paced read, with Thomas's black-and-white drawings highlighting key moments. This sequel stands on its own, but readers may want to go back and learn how unique Gooney Bird Greene became a part of this classroom.-Kristine M. Casper, Huntington Public Library, NY (c) Copyright 2010. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
Kirkus Review
The irrepressible second grader returns, as flamboyant as ever, to offer more outrageous outfits, "absolutely true" yarns and such useful vocabulary words as "ennui" and "underestimate." All the while, she's wangling the role of Squanto in the Thanksgiving Pageant by recruiting a mysterious Room Mother, and also helping her gentle teacher Mrs. Pidgeon keep a roomful of rambunctious classmates on task with the pageant preparations. Larger than life and with a heart as big as her personality, Gooney Bird Greene will elicit gales of laughter, along with sighs of appreciation, from Suzy Kline and Junie B. Jones fans--as well as their parents--in this second winning, tongue-in-cheek outing. (Fiction. 7-9) Copyright ©Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
Excerpts
Excerpts
It was early November. Mrs. Pidgeon's second grade students were hard at work on their Pilgrim mural, which had been laid out on the floor. All of the desks had been pushed to one side to make room, and the second-graders were on their hands and knees, working with crayons. Gooney Bird Greene was right in the middle, as usual. "I like to be right smack in the middle of everything," Gooney Bird always said. The children's shoes were lined up in the coatroom because Mrs. Pidgeon had suggested that it would be wise to take them off. If they walked on the edge of the mural, their shoes would leave marks. "We always take our shoes off at home," Keiko had said as she untied her sneakers, "because my family came from Japan, and in Japan people never ever wear shoes in the house." One by one the children had removed their shoes. Gooney Bird took the longest because she was wearing hiking boots that laced halfway up to her knees. When, finally, her boots were unlaced and removed, everyone could see that Gooney Bird was wearing one red sock and one yellow one. "Gooney Bird's socks don't match!" Malcolm called out, pointing. "Of course they don't," Gooney Bird said. "I hardly ever wear matching socks." "Doesn't your mother roll your socks neatly into balls when she takes them out of the dryer? Doesn't she match them up very carefully?" Beanie asked. Gooney Bird thought about that. She looked down at her own feet and wiggled her toes, one set of toes in a red sock, one in a yellow. "No," she said. "My mother puts all of my clean socks in a basket on the floor of my closet. And every day I choose two. Some days I feel like matching, but most days I don't. "Most often," she went on, "wearing matching things gives me a feeling of ennui." "Oh, my," said Mrs. Pidgeon. She went to the board and wrote ENNUI in big letters. "Class? You know what to do." All of the second-graders took their dictionaries out of their desks. At the beginning of the school year, the classroom had only one dictionary, which sat on Mrs. Pidgeon's desk, next to her coffee mug. But Gooney Bird Greene, the new student, had arrived in October. Gooney Bird had very strong opinions about things. She had brought her own very large dictionary from home. On her first day in the classroom, she announced that she thought that every second-grader should have a very large dictionary. Mrs. Pidgeon, who was not accustomed to Gooney Bird yet, smiled. "We've always just used this one," she said, picking up the dictionary from her desk. It was slightly dusty. "The school provided it. And it's pretty old. But the school budget doesn't allow for bigger or better dictionaries." "If someone provided newer, more interesting dictionaries, one for each child, would you use them?" Gooney Bird asked. Mrs. Pidgeon laughed. "Yes," she said. "Of course I would." "Give me one week," Gooney Bird said. Exactly one week later, a very heavy box containing twentytwo very heavy dictionaries was delivered to Mrs. Pidgeon's classroom by a man who had tattoos and big muscles. He brought the box in on a wheeled dolly. "How on earth did you accomplish this, Gooney Bird?" Mrs. Pidgeon asked as she unpacked the dictionaries and passed one to each student. "I planned my work," Gooney Bird said, "and then I worked my plan." "What was your plan?" Barry Tuckerman asked as he examined his thick new dictionary. "First I put on the right outfit." Everyone giggled. They had known Gooney Bird Greene for only a short time, but each day she had worn a different outfit, and some of her outfits were amazing. "What did you wear?" asked Keiko. "Pajamas and cowboy boots?" That was what Gooney Bird had worn on her first day at school. "Of course not. This was for a businesslike visit. I wore my long, black, up-to-the-elbow gloves, my silver wet-look ski pants, a T-shirt with a picture of Albert Einstein on it, and my straw hat with a small artificial flower. I think the flower is a camellia." "And where did you go, wearing your businesslike outfit?" Mrs. Pidgeon asked. She handed a dictionary to Tricia and reached for another. "I went to the public library. We only just moved to the town of Watertower, as you know. But my parents have always told me that the public library is one of the first places you must visit in a new town. So I did that . . . " "Wearing your hat with the camellia?" Mrs. Pidgeon asked. "Yes, of course. I introduced myself to the head librarian, the assistant librarian, the children's librarian, the reference librarian, and the janitor." "Just the way you introduced yourself to us on the first day? I remember you said--" All of the children remembered too. They said it together. "My name is Gooney Bird Greene and I want a desk right smack in the middle of the room, because I like to be right smack in the middle of everything." "Well, why would I say that to the librarians? I didn't want a desk in the library. I wanted dictionaries." Mrs. Pidgeon was laughing. "And so you said--" "I said, 'I'm Gooney Bird Greene and I'm new in town and I would like to know what you do with your old dictionaries, because my second-grade class needs twenty-two of them.'" The children all applauded. "And so they sent us the dictionaries!" Mrs. Pidgeon said in delight. "Nope." "Oh. Well, what happened?" "They said that the old dictionaries were in the basement collecting dust, but they didn't have twenty-two, and also the old dictionaries were obsolete--we can look that word up after we get them all unpacked--and anyway what we needed were nice new dictionaries." "These do look brand new," Mrs. Pidgeon said, examining one. Gooney Bird continued. "Then, suddenly . . . " The class grinned. They loved it when Gooney Bird said "suddenly." They waited eagerly to hear what came next. " . . . the head librarian went to the phone and called a rich man she knew and said, 'Charles, get down here right away, because there's an enterprising young lady you must meet.' "So a man named Charles came and shook my hand, and--" "With your glove on? Or did you take your glove off?" Chelsea wanted to know. "On. He shook it through my glove. Then we talked and had tea, and suddenly . . . " Everyone grinned again, and waited. " . . . he ordered twenty-two brand-new dictionaries, and here they are." When the dictionaries had been distributed to every student, Mrs. Pidgeon moved the empty carton to the coatroom. "Gooney Bird Greene," she said, "you are indefatigable." The students tried to say the word. "Indefeat . . . " "Undeff . . . " "Indeteff . . . " Mrs. Pidgeon wrote it at the top of the board, in large printing. "Class," she said, "get out your dictionaries. We will have a lesson in dictionary use." Excerpted from Gooney Bird and the Room Mother by Lois Lowry All rights reserved by the original copyright owners. Excerpts are provided for display purposes only and may not be reproduced, reprinted or distributed without the written permission of the publisher.
