Margarita Ruiz

Summary:
Maria made the best chestnuts in town and always had a line of children waiting for them. She was very kind and everyone loved her. Another lady, who was not nearly as nice as Maria, stole Maria's chestnuts in a fit of jealousy. When she realized the children were sad and Maria had no chestnuts left to sell them, the other woman apologized and they worked together from then on.

Personal Reaction: The story was really sweet because Maria wanted to help every child in town. The version I read had the Spanish translation at the top of each page so I thought it was perfect for multicultural.

Classroom Extension:
1)Have the students that are bilingual, if any, translate a moment in their life to the classroom.
2) Pair students up and give them a group project to where each child must contribute something to the team.… (meer)

This book is basically the story about the birth of Jesus, but it has a character that no one knows about. This character is a spider that lives in the shop of Jose and watches him work. The spider and Jose talk everyday, and during one of their conversations Jose tells the spider that he is off to Belen. The spider really wanted to go so he made a spider web inside the bag of Mary and they rode off to Belen. Once they arrived in Belen they found a shed and that is where baby Jesus was born. During the night baby Jesus was shivering from the cold winds that were coming in through a crack on the wall. Spider took it into his hands and made a thick wall of spider web to cover the crack, but he got stuck outside. The poor spider died that night due to the cold winds but the moon light reflected off his body and made the first Christmas star.… (meer)