Tuesdays With Morrie
Tuesdays with Morrie may be too difficult for readers younger than 9th grade. The following books with similar themes have been selected for younger readers:
Preschool
Just Grandma and Me by Mercer Mayer ( j )
Just Grandpa and Me by Mercer Mayer ( j )
Little Critter spends a day alone with each of his grandparents:
he and Grandma go to the beach, and he and Grandpa go shopping
for new clothes.
Kindergarten
- Grade 2
Can You Do This, Old Badger? by Eve Bunting, illustrated
by LeUyen Pham ( j )
Little Badger finds that although Old Badger can't do some things
as easily as he used to, he still has some useful and important
skills to teach.
Grades 3 &
4
The Piano by William Miller, illustrated by Susan Keeter
( j )
Tia, a young black girl who loves music, finds a job in the home
of an older white woman who not only teaches her to play the piano
but also becomes her friend.
Grade 5
A Single Shard by Linda Sue Park (Juv Fic)
Tree-ear, an orphan in medieval Korea, lives with Crane-man, a
lame straw weaver, under a bridge in a potters' village and longs
to learn to make the delicate celadon ceramics himself.
Grade 6
The Cay by Theodore Taylor (Juv Fic)
When the freighter on which they are traveling is torpedoed by
a German submarine during World War II, Phillip, a teenage white
boy blinded by a blow to the head, and Timothy, an old black man,
are stranded on a tiny Caribbean island, where the boy learns
a new kind of vision, courage and love from his old companion.
Grade 7
Walk Two Moons by Sharon Creech (YA Fic)
13-year-old Salamanca and her eccentric grandparents travel from
Ohio to Idaho in search of Sal's mother, who left one April morning
and hasn't returned.
Grade 8
Hope Was Here by Joan Bauer (YA Fic)
When 16-year-old Hope and her aunt move from Brooklyn to run a
small-town diner in Wisconsin, they don't expect to get caught
up in town politics and the diner owner's campaign to defeat the
corrupt mayor.
Discussion Questions for Kids & Families
1. What did you notice when you read this
book?
2. How did what you read make you feel?
3. How can you relate what you read to your own life?
4. What are the different ways that the characters deal with their
challenges?
5. Who do you think are the heroes in this book? Why?
6. How would the characters' lives be different if they hadn't
been together?
