Author & Illustrator: Charlotte Dumaresq Hunt ( Known as Demi) Publisher:Scholastic Year of Publication: 1996 Genre:Fables, Folk Tales and Myths Horn Book or Kirkus Review rating: Hornbook Review of a 3.
Summary:One Grain of Rice is a wonderful picture book that takes place in India years ago. A long time ago in India a raja ruled the country. He ruled it with fairness and thought out every one of his actions, causing him to rule it very wisely, and with caution. His wiseness in the book was portrayed by him requiring the rice that was grown to be stored away. The raja would provide rice if a famine would ever strike. Eventually the famine occurred and the raja was reluctant to let the rice go. A young girl named Rani comes to him in favor of one grain of rice. He starts off by giving her one then continues to give her multiple grains of rice. The girl only asks for one grain of rice and this puzzles the Raja.
Review by Sasha Ishak:One Grain of Rice is an astonishing folktale full of life inside and outside. The illustrations inside the book are breathtaking and definitely bring the book to life for young readers. Even though this story is a mathematical folktale it teaches children about the Indian Culture, and it has a marvelous moral to the story. The moral of the story is fairness and being wise. The Raja in the story is not so wise because he saves rice for a tragedy known as the famine and when it happens he doesn’t even give the rice to the people. One of the main characters in the story is Rani, Rani surprises the Raja with her intelligence and great deal of being able to think wisely, which the Raja has not done. With the breathtaking illustrations the illustrator creates a feeling of the book actually being a folktale, which clearly caught my eye throughout reading the entire book. The thick white borders around the pages are the only thing that distract the reader from fully engaging in the text. But overall this children’s book is a great way to teach children about mathematical principles and at the same time informing them about the Indian Culture.
Summary of Professional Reviews:According to Horn Book Reviews, One Grain of Rice received a rating of a 3. The review gives a brief summary of the people including the request from Rani. It tells the reader the number of days the rice was delivered for and how much rice Rani got each day. At the end of the review Horn book explains how the book ends and what illustrations are on the last page. The last page in the back of the book is a two- fold out page that is complete with “gold paint” that displays the elephants who are providing Rani with grains of rice. This book would be useful when teaching...
One Grain of Rice would be useful in Language Arts when teaching about character traits. The teacher can create a lesson and teach the children about character traits and how it relates to the characters in this astonishing picture book.
Another thing that a teacher can do with this book is to introduce other Indian Folktales and compare the two using a Venn Diagram. This will allow children to see the difference between the two, and it will also allow them to come with an underlying theme between them.