One Came Home
Written By Amy Timberlake
Copyright 2013
Random House Children's Books
Reading Level: Lexile- 690, Grade Level- 5-6
A 2014 Newbery Medal Honor Book
An ALA-ALSC Notable Children's Book
Winner of Edgar Allen Poe Award for Best Juvenile Novel
"mystery, sisters, misadventure, historical, Wisconsin"
Plot
In 1871, Placid, Wisconsin, young Georgie Burkhardt is known for her sharp shooting skills and her tendency to speak her mind freely. After her older sister Agatha flees town with traveling pigeoners, and the sheriff returns weeks later with an unidentifiable body wearing Agatha's dress, everyone assumes the worst. Georgie refuses to conform to the common belief that Agatha is dead and sets out on her own journey to find her older sister. With her determination and help from her friend, Billy McCabe, Georgie travels through the west searching for traces of her missing sister. However, her skills and resolution can never prepare her for some of the trials she will face on the western frontier.
Suggested Delivery
Read aloud to students over the course of multiple readings.
2. Reading Strategies
Before Reading:
Before reading One Came Home, have students build schema/ prior knowledge about the setting in which the story takes place. Using the electronic sources listed above, students can view photographs and primary sources displaying daily life in 1870s Placid, Wisconsin and passenger pigeons. Ask student to study the pictures and encourage them to ask questions and make observations. After studying the pictures, ask the students to complete a venn diagram that compares life in Placid Wisconsin in 1871 to life today
During Reading:
The main character, Georgie, is a rounded character who changes over the course of the story. To increase both literal and inferential comprehension have students create a "Storyboard" that analyzes the changes in Georgie's character against the events taking place in the story. While students map out the actual events occurring in the story, engaging their literal comprehension, they will also be making inferences to what Georgie is thinking and feeling and how she is changing.
After Reading:
After completing the text, separate students into groups of 3-4 and increase comprehension by carrying out a tossed terms activity. Give each group a cube or a ball to (gently) throw around and define whatever term from the text faces up. Use the vocabulary from above, or have students use vocabulary they didn't understand from the text.
3. Writing Activity:
After reading the text students can complete an activity that increases comprehension while encouraging students to write from a different point of view. Ask students to consider the events in the story while writing a diary entry in Agatha's voice about the day she decided to leave Placid or about the day she discovered Georgie had been searching for her. Students should look back into the text for evidence to support their journal entry and be encouraged to use vocabulary taken from the text.
Electronic Resources
http://recollectionwisconsin.org/
This site contains countless stories and photos regarding the history of Wisconsin. Viewing these primary sources will give students a chance to build schema about the location and time period that the book takes place before reading.
https://www.audubon.org/magazine/may-june-2014/why-passenger-pigeon-went-extinct
The National Audubon Society is a well-credited source that can be used in this case to explain what passenger pigeons are to students. Passenger pigeons went extinct years ago and its likely that most or all students would not know what they are. Since passenger pigeons play a very large and recurring role in this story, its essential for students to learn general information about them prior to reading the book.
Teaching Suggestions
1. Vocabulary:
- Decomposition: a natural process that causes something to be slowly broken down
- Suitor: a man who wants to marry a particular woman
- Eulogy: a speech that praises someone who has died
- Condolence: a feeling of sympathy or sadness especially when someone is suffering
- Psalm: a song or poem used in worship, particularly from the bible
- Influx: the arrival of a large amount of people or things
- Submersion: to go underwater; to be fully involved in an activity or interest
- Precede: to happen, go, or come before
- Loiter: to remain in an area without a particular reason to be there
- Onerous: difficult and unpleasant to deal with
- Palatable: having a pleasant or agreeable taste
Before Reading:
Before reading One Came Home, have students build schema/ prior knowledge about the setting in which the story takes place. Using the electronic sources listed above, students can view photographs and primary sources displaying daily life in 1870s Placid, Wisconsin and passenger pigeons. Ask student to study the pictures and encourage them to ask questions and make observations. After studying the pictures, ask the students to complete a venn diagram that compares life in Placid Wisconsin in 1871 to life today
During Reading:
The main character, Georgie, is a rounded character who changes over the course of the story. To increase both literal and inferential comprehension have students create a "Storyboard" that analyzes the changes in Georgie's character against the events taking place in the story. While students map out the actual events occurring in the story, engaging their literal comprehension, they will also be making inferences to what Georgie is thinking and feeling and how she is changing.
After Reading:
After completing the text, separate students into groups of 3-4 and increase comprehension by carrying out a tossed terms activity. Give each group a cube or a ball to (gently) throw around and define whatever term from the text faces up. Use the vocabulary from above, or have students use vocabulary they didn't understand from the text.
3. Writing Activity:
After reading the text students can complete an activity that increases comprehension while encouraging students to write from a different point of view. Ask students to consider the events in the story while writing a diary entry in Agatha's voice about the day she decided to leave Placid or about the day she discovered Georgie had been searching for her. Students should look back into the text for evidence to support their journal entry and be encouraged to use vocabulary taken from the text.
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