Junie B., First Grader: Toothless Wonder

The children’s novel Junie B., First Grader: Toothless Wonder is written by Barbara Park and illustrated by Denise Brunkus. The target audience for this book is 1-3 grade girls.

-Rating: 4 out of 5 Stars ****

-Summary: Junie B. Jones is a first grader and she is the first one of her class to have a loose top, front tooth. She is worried about loosing her tooth because she does not want to look different. She is hesitant about the tooth fairy and struggles to decide whether or not she wants to give her tooth away.

Junie B. Jones is a series of easy read books geared towards young elementary school girls who are just learning to read. Junie B. Toothless Wonder is told by Junie herself through narration and journal entries she does in school. I like that a student similar in age to the students who would read these books is narrating the story. The language is of what a lower elementary school student would use and the sentences are short and easy to read for beginners. There is a sense of innocence to the text since it narrated by a child. Her side comments about her parents and classmates add a sense of humor. This book does have illustrations but they are few and far between. They illustrations add to the text because they illustrate critical scenes in the book and give young readers a visual. The illustrations are in black and white but they are detailed and offer another visual aid to readers who want to visualize what Junie looks like while they are reading along. The books is a good beginning novel for young readers because it has an easy to follow storyline but also is introducing them to a longer reading challenging new readers. 

I would use this book in my classroom as an independent reading novel or with reading groups. I like the idea of the book but it is more for a female audience. It is an easily relatable topic for young students. Everyone goes through the phase of loosing teeth and getting excited about what the tooth fairy will leave under the pillow. Some students might be afraid to loose a tooth and this book can calm any apprehension and explain it is normal for everyone to feel scared similar to Junie but in the end everything is okay. There are also great topics brought up in the book as well. The issue of peer pressure/influence comes up when Junie is talking about loosing her teeth with her classmates. Some students tell her that she might look funny or be different from everyone else and ultimately she isn’t excited about her tooth falling out due to other people’s opinions. Teachers can explain to students that it is okay to have differing thoughts than others and that one should not be easily persuaded by what others think. Also, the issue of recycling is explained through out the book that can tie into a lesson about the environment and recycling in the classroom. The only hesitation I have about using this in the classroom is that the book is 80 pages long and that might be too long for certain new readers. Teacher’s need to make sure that students are capable of reading that long of a book and have advanced enough reading skills to make it through. 

Other Junie B. Jones Books