Little Gold Star

Title: Little Gold Star
Author: Joe Hayes
Illustrators: Gloria Osuna Perez and Lucia Angela Perez
Publisher and date of Publication; Cinco Puntos Press, 2000
Genre: Multicultural, Picture Book
Age Range: 1st-4th grade

Summary: This is a Cinderella story that is written in english and spanish. Each page has english and spanish on it. Arcia convinced her dad to marry their neighbor because she was so nice to her. After they got married, Arcia's step-mom changed and made Arcia do all the chores. Arcia is doing chores and meets a big hawk. She follows his directions and is blessed with jewels. The step sisters do the same thing but they don't follow the hawk's directions and end up with a donkey ear and a green cow horn.

Response: This was one of the Cinderella versions that I read for class and really enjoyed it. I really like that it had english and spanish because children can see how it is in spanish and spanish students can read the same story. It's an interesting different take on cinderella. I like that she got a little gold star on her head. A lot of children can identify with the story because they are from step families. I really liked that Arcia got married at the end.

Teaching Ideas: This would be so good because children could see the english and spanish. We could read this book with the spanish teacher or read it when studying fairytales and incorporate spanish into it. Children could get little gold star stickers and put on their foreheads to get "into" the story. This has so much you could do with this story!