SS
Rhyming story that celebrates friendship, childhood, sharing with others
In the story, everyone is hungry and sits down to eat. But, Andres' mom forgot to pack his lunch! Andres is sad and hungry, until the First-Grade Friends help out by sharing their lunches with him!

The Lunch Box Surprise by Grace Maccarone is a fiction book about a group of kids who are excited for lunch. When they get to lunch they open up their lunch boxes to see what their parents packed them. Sadly one of the students lunch box is empty. Together the rest of the kids share a piece of their lunch with the child and then everyone has something to eat. The author does a good job teaching kids the importance of sharing. Also the book has a student that is in a wheelchair but instead of using the wheelchair to define the child they called the child by their name and that was what was most beautiful to me about this story. The more inclusive books,movies, and tv shows are the more inclusive the world would be. I would recommend this book to anyone in second grade or younger. It’s important to teach kids these values early on. ( )

I really enjoyed reading this book. The first reason I liked this book was because of the writing. The book used very simple words and it rhymed, so it made it easy and fun to read. Another reason I liked this book was because of the characters. One of the characters, Pam, was in a wheelchair. I did not like the fact that she was in a wheelchair, I liked the fact that the story had a character with disabilities because that is not something I have seen in many books. The last reason I enjoyed reading the book was because of the illustrations. They were very simple, yet they enhanced the story because the simple words used in the story and the simple pictures pulled the book together as a whole. The illustrations looked like they could have been drawn by students. The main idea of this book is friendship sharing. Sam's mother forgot to pack him a lunch for school, so when he got to lunch he was really hungry, but his friends helped him solve this problem by sharing their lunches with him. ( )

This was a fun, short story with a valuable lesson. The story depicted a group of friends working together to solve a problem among the group. I appreciated the subtle way that a student in a wheelchair was depicted as just one of the friends. Not too often are children with disabilities portrayed in the story as just one of the friends. There is no mention of his disability and I think that's great. It great for a young child to see that bringing attention to a disability is not necessary. Everyone sits down for lunch and compares lunches, but when Sam opens his box he has nothing. It seems as though his Mom forgot to pack his lunch. His friends work together and offer Sam parts of their lunches to make a meal for him. The title of the story allows readers to guess what the surprise might be before the plot is revealed. It's a great early reader because the use of rhyming allows the reader to follow a rhythm. ( )

This short simple rhyming book tells a great story.

Sam opens his lunchbox to discover his mom forgot to pack his lunch. All of his friends give him a bit of what is in their lunches. At the end Sam has a feast.

I was just introduced this book a couple of years ago but I use it every year to teach a lesson about sharing. The kids think it is fun. ( )