One of my favorite things in the world is when a student comes to me and has read a new book (all on their own) and wants to share it . Recently, one of my sweet students brought a novel to me and said, "You just have to read this book! Will you read it aloud to the whole class?"Of course I had to make sure that it was appropriate to read, but once that was done, I agreed.

Every day after lunch we gather on the rug for read aloud time. This is not our regular reading time, but rather a calm and relaxing time of day that I read to them. It's amazing how this small part of our day has enhanced our classroom! My students can't wait to claim their spot on the rug and listen to our current read aloud novel. Some of the stories we've read have sparked unbelievable conversations. Talk about some real character ed going on!!!!!

Anyway. . .the title of this novel that was brought to me was The Miraculous Journey of Edward Tulane by Kate DiCamillo. (She is the author of Because of Winn-Dixie.) I could immediately tell that this was going to be one of those "cliff hanger" books for my kiddo's. Every day they would beg for me to keep on reading, even at the cost of losing some recess time. As I read, I wondered if they were truly "getting" what the story was all about. The underlying theme was deep in nature.

Several days into the novel, one of my students proclaimed to the class that he didn't completely understand something about the story. To my delight, another student jumped in and totally explained the correlation that he was not connecting together. She may have even explained it better than I could have! My heart swelled up with pride! Wow ~ they got it! They, the entire class, understood the "deeper meaning" of the story.

Now, the crazy thing is, I'm convinced that the story was for me. It was about the heart of someone that been broken - experienced love, loss, and had found a way to love again!