Knucklehead: Tall Tales and Almost True Stories of Growing up Scieszka by Jon Scieszka

I was going to do a formal review of Knucklehead: Tall Tales and Almost True Stories of Growing up Scieszka this weekend. But then I booktalked it to both classes yesterday. And I haven’t seen it since!

Perhaps this is even better than a formal review. 🙂 When I read a few chapters aloud to my students, they were literally in hysterics. There were shouts of, “I’ve done that!” and “My mom would flip out if she knew I did this stuff, too!”. It especially seemed to connect with boys but I had quite a few girls ask to get on the waiting list, too. Thank goodness our librarian just got her copy of Knucklehead: Tall Tales and Almost True Stories of Growing up Scieszka in this week, because I know about 20 6th graders who are going to be fighting for that copy, too!

This is a fantastic book for reluctant readers and readaholics. And for anyone who has grown up with younger brothers and sisters and done all of those things your mom would die over if she found out about. I am the oldest of six and felt like I was reading about my own life, especially when Jon talked about his adventures in Catholic school and adopting “Pagan babies” in Africa. If you don’t have this one in your classroom library, you need it!