Children's Reading List: American Girl Josefina and Lapbook


11/8/2011

My daughter is zipping through the American Girl books. She's now finished reading about the third American Girl - Josefina, who grew up on a ranch in New Mexico in 1824.

I've not read any of the Josefina books so I relied on my daughter to pass on the highlights of each book. For each American Girl, there are 6 main books that tell her story.

When my girl finished the books, we made a lapbook about Josefina just as we had done for the previous two girls. A lapbook is simply a fancy formatted book report or character study. All of the American Girl lapbook materials we use can be found online for free at this site.

Here's my daughter with her lapbook, showing the cover picture she drew of Josefina in her bright Mexican dress.

Here's the inside of the lapbook, showing mini-books on Who Is Josefina, Living in 1824, Hobbies, Favorite Things, What I Learned From This Story, Prized Possessions, Pets and What Josefina's House Was Like.

Then the lapbook unfolds to two more pages, showing mini-books on Living in 1824, Conflict, Josefina's Father's Job, My Favorite Book of the Series, Spanish Words and a map of the United States to show where Josefina lived.

My daughter liked the numerous Spanish words found throughout the story. She did very well coming up with a few facts about life in 1824 also, to put in the mini-books about that time period. For example, Josefina's family (being ranchers) had a bed in their house near the kitchen were orphaned lambs were kept and at Christmas a special play is performed, acting out scenes from the first Christmas with Jesus in the manger.

My daughter read through this series very quickly and is again itching to move on to the next historical American Girl - Kirsten, from the pioneer era. She is compelled by both her love of reading and her desire to take me up on my offer of a trip to Chicago to the American Girl store when she finishes all of the books!

1 comments:

amara abram said...

i like her stories i am dressing up as her today because it is read across america day yeah

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