1. to introduce a new genre - historical fiction.
   
   
2. to explore the significance of time and place (Setting) to plot.
   
   
3. to encourage responses to reading using "Say Something".
   
   
4. to develop an understanding of the immigrant experience.
   
   
5. to review and consolidate the topic of comprehension "fix-up" strategic'.
   
   
6. to provide a link between reading fiction and reading factual material.

1. Explains the underlying concept of historical fiction
   
   As is the ease for all stories, stories that are categorized as historical fiction originate in the author's imagination. But historical fiction is also based on fact. It reflects life in the past and can help us catch a glimpse of what it was like to live in particular fumes and in particular places - as no history textbook is able to do.
   
   The story Sarah Plain and Tall that we read previously can be classified as historical fiction. Laura Ingalls Wilder's Little House on the Prairie popularized in the television series, tells about life on the American frontier. The Anne of Green Gables stories by Lucy Maude Montgomery paint a picture of life in the Canadian maritimes in the early 1900's. These stories are fictional but have a historical setting in terms of time and place.
   
   
2. Introduces the story for the session - Pettranella by Betty Waterton (1992 Meadow Mouse paperback edition), first copyrighted in 1980:

NOTE: This story holds particular interest for participants in the Book Bridges program because the final setting is in Manitoba and tells about the immigrant experience in the early 1900's. Another selection from the historical fiction genre may be more appropriate, depending upon the background of participants. A chapter book with immigration as the topic is Nykola and Granny by Constance Home, published by Gage in 1989, which tells about a young boy being left behind when his parents immigrate from the Ukraine to Canada. This selection may be more appropriate for more advanced readers. Naomi's Road, by Joy Kogawa and Sadako and the Thousand Paper Cranes, by E. Coerr are further suggestions.