The life of a sweet American/mexican girl and wanting to find her own place at home where she can be herself.

In my opinion, this book is very good for students in the elementary age group. The illustrations, plot, and multilingualism all help the author to portray the story. The illustrations give context clues to the Spanish words in the book which can help readers. For example, when the author mentions her "abuela", there is an illustration of her grandmother. The illustrations of the closet that is turned into her room and the chaos in her house also show her strong want for her own space. The plot of the story, wanting to have your own space, is something that children from large families can understand is something that can be shown to children from smaller families to help them understand. For example, she shares a room with her five brothers and wants "a place that I can call my own" with an illustration depicting that "there was aways a long line for the bathroom". This plot is relatable to almost everyone, as everyone wants a place to be there own ,but it can make others feel grateful that they have more than a closet. Finally, the multilingualism helps both ELL students understand the book as well as helping English-speaking students to learn Spanish. Even the book's title "My Very Own Room/Mi prop cuartito" helps the author to portray the story since the main character comes from a Spanish-speaking household. This book can help students to see different cultures and be thankful for the space they have. The main idea that although family is important, everyone needs some space is evident in the book. ( )

In my opinion this is a good book for a couple of reasons. First, I like that the book is bilingual. Each page has the words written in English on one side of the page and Spanish on the other. For example, when the girl’s mother told her that she could use the storage room as her own bedroom. The girl said, “Mama, it’s perfect!” and in the Spanish translation she said, “Mama, es perfecto!” I also like this book because the main character is very believable. She is a young girl that has five brothers that she has to share a room with. She longs to have her own room and to have some privacy from her brothers. This is a very relatable character for any children who have had to share a room with their sibling. In the beginning of the book she says, I was getting too big for this…I was tired of sharing a room with my five little brothers. More than anything in the whole world I wanted a room of my own.” The overall big idea of this story that sometimes in order to get what you want you have to be patient and work for it. In the story, the girl had to wait a long time before she could have her own room. She also had to work in order to get the room she wanted. She had to move boxes, paint the room, find a bed, and save blue stamps so she could buy a lamp. When her room was finally finished she “felt like the luckiest, happiest little girl in the world.” She said that, “everyone in the family had helped to make her wish come true.” ( )

In my opinion, this is a great book that could be read to students or have in a classroom. One of the reasons I enjoyed this book was because of the way the writing was set up. On each page, there was a paragraph written in English and directly underneath the same paragraph was written in Spanish. This book would be perfect to read to a class of ELL students because they can follow along with the Spanish words and compare them to the English words. Another reason I enjoyed this story is because there were pictures on all of the pages that followed along with the story and allowed readers to see what this girl and her family in the story would look like. Last, this story is about a family of 8, 5 boys, 1 girl, and a mother and a father all living in a 2 bedroom house that is very crowded and the young girl does not have her own space for her to be herself. This story would be able to relate to young elementary aged girls who may be going through changes where they want to have a place to be their own. At the end of the story, the young girl and her mother find her a spot of her own after they clean out their attic and make a small room for her. The main message of this story is family and about immigrants who may not have the space needed for a large family, but somehow still being happy and making do with what they do have. ( )

This is a multicultural book about a girl in a large family in a small house who do not have the money to have a larger home so she shares with 5 brothers. She then comes up with the idea to create her room and seperates it using curtains as walls. Her family works together to make it happen for her and her moms scrapes up some stamps they use for stores as money to buy things and she buys a new lamp for her room. The little girl is so excited and makes it work with what she has. In the end she winds up with her own room that she appreciates. This is a great book for first grade learning about appreciation and how to work with what you have. This is also a great way to show kids different cultures and that not everyone has the same background. ( )