All posts by tpretz

I am the elementary librarian at The American School in Japan.

Gr. 4 Book Bingo

Realistic Fiction Rules by Cynthia Lord

Rules is the story of a twelve-year-old girl named Catherine, who is torn between caring for her autistic brother David and doing what she really wants to do during summer break.

MysterySwindle by Gordon Korman

If you like books about kids taking matters into their own hands, you’ll enjoy this fast-paced mystery.  After being “swindled”, Griffin Bing and his team will do just about anything to get back his Babe Ruth baseball card.

Adventure –  Magic Pickle and the Planet of the Grapes by Scott Morse
A lunchtime accident in the lab creates the Magic Pickle, the perfect superhero, ready to save the world from all sorts of bad guys and fight for truth and justice!

Fantasy – I Freddy:  Book One in the Golden Hamster Saga by Dietlof Reiche

I, Freddy Freddy is not an ordinary hamster.  Freddy is a thinking, talking, reading, writing hamster.  In order to get out of the pet store, Freddy must come up with a plan.  What will Freddy do to get out of the cage that is holding him back?  If you have never picked up the first book in this series, give it a try if you like Fantasy and Humor.

Summer Checkout Success!

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The bookshelves are looking mighty bare in the ASIJ Elementary Library.  After three days of patrons visiting the library to checkout books for summer reading, the checkout statistics are phenomenal this year.  Without bribes, prizes or golden stickers, over 2x as many books were checked out this summer than last summer.

Total Summer Checkouts 2015 3,944 books

Total Summer Checkouts 2014 1,806 books

My goal this year was to support and encourage independent reading and wild readers.  I do not think I could have ended my first year as the ASIJ Elementary Librarian on a happier note.

Project Gutenberg

ProjectGutenberg

Project Gutenberg offers over 49,000 free eBooks.  Choose among free ePub books, free Kindle books, download them or read them online.  If you are looking for a “classic” to download, Project Gutenberg will more than likely have the ePub title you desire.

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