Emma and the Blue Genie
Written by Cornelia Funke
Translated by Oliver Latsch
Illustrated by Kerstin Meyer
Published by Random House New York
Copyright 2014
90 pages
A/R Grade Level: 4.8
Emma and the Blue Genie is an international fairy tale. Emma and her dog, Tristan, find a bottle in the ocean one night and release a genie, Karim. Karim has lost his ability to grant wishes. Karim's nose ring was stolen by the evil genie, Sahim and therefore, Karim's powers are lost. Emma and Tristan fly with Karim back to his master's palace to help him get his nose ring back. They embark on a wonderful adventure and eventually defeat the evil genie, retrieve the lost nose ring, and Karim regains his powers and banishes the evil genie forever.
This book offers an excellent alternative to the traditional storyline found in most books about genies and wishes. It could be used as part of an English language arts unit for reading and comprehension. It has rich vocabulary with many unfamiliar words that could easily be explained to students before the reading of the book. This book would be an excellent way to introduce students to varying versions of similar stories by reading it along with the more well-known Aladdin book and comparing and contrasting the stories. By introducing unfamiliar vocabulary, a teacher would be able to assist students in researching these new words, defining these words, and discussing the setting of the book. Sparking interest in reading is a challenge for teachers much of time and this book would be easy to use to accomplish this task.
I love the idea of using an international book that students might not know instead of using the well known books. Showing students that books can have several different versions is a great idea, and a fun way to compare and contrast how different authors tell the same story.
ReplyDelete