Soyung Pak

This story was about a little boy, Juno who loved receiving letters from his grandmother who lived in Korea. He also drew and sent her pictures in a letter because he figured she would like getting letters from him too. Even though he could not read the letters from his grandma on his own, he was able to understand what she was saying based on the things she sent with the letter, and the pictures. The big idea of this story was family relationships. This story showed the importance of show more communicating with your family members even if they live in a totally different country than you. I liked this book for two reasons. The first was because of the little boy’s character. He had so much confidence and pride that his grandmother had written him, and that even though he could not write words back to her, he was able to draw her pictures and he knew that she would know exactly what he meant. For example, as Juno was showing his parents the pictures he had written, his dad said “It’s just like a real letter.” Juno responded with such confidence saying “It is a real letter.” The second reason I liked this book was because there were two pages across that showed one illustration of the grandmother looking at Juno’s leaf and drawings. I thought this picture showed how he and the grandmother connected even though he could not read what she wrote to him. It showed how excited she was to receive and to read his letters too. show less

Dear Juno tells the story of a boy who receives a letter from his grandmother in Seoul. He is unable to read the letter because it is written in Korean, but he is able to understand the intent of his grandmother's letter through the photograph and a dry flower. Shows the delicate relationship between a grandson and grandma and the loss of culture within immigrants.

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This book had a lasting impression on me because I am a Korean-American and it was a different feeling to read a book that show more actually pertained to me and my heritage show less

A Place To Grow by Soyung Pak (Author), Marcelino Truong (Illustrator)
Arthur A. Levine Books (2002), Edition: First Edition, 32 pages

A Place to Grow is a picture book written by Soyung Pak and illustrated by Marcelino Truong. A Place to Grow belongs in the historical fiction genre. While it doesn't necessarily denote the time period, the information in the book relates that the events of the father characters immigration journey happened in the recent past.

The story of A Place to Grow is show more about the love of family and immigration. As a father and daughter work together in their garden, he explains what a seed needs to flourish and the reasons their family immigrated to a new country--looking for hope, like sunlight, and peace, like good earth. The book uses the metaphor of gardening to discuss the various reasons and situations someone might leave their home country. I think this idea is best explained with a quote from the book, "Some seeds just hop from where they were born. Others catch the wind and fly far, far away."

This book has this incredibly gorgeous art that looks like it was painted on the page with these gorgeous blues and grays in different parts of the book. I think this is a great book to use as a way to discuss immigration as a part of our culture, specifically asian-american immigrant cultures. While this isn't necessarily a story about real people immigrating, the writer and author have family who emigrated from Korea and Vietnam respectively, so this is a very authentic look at this part of their families culture. I highly recommend this book as a tribute to family and what drives someone to leave their home to find a new life. show less

Dear Juno is a fictional picture book that depicts a young boy named Juno who receives letters from his grandma back in Korea. However Juno cannot read in Korean and only understands the pictures that are attached to his grandma's letters. One day, Juno sees that his grandma received a cat and has attached a flower from her garden. Juno decides to "write" back to his grandma in the form of a drawing so that she can understand what he is trying to illustrate. After he sends his letter, Juno show more receives a new letter that shows his grandma taking care of two kittens. She also proclaims that she has to rename her cat because Juno is a boy's name. More importantly his grandma sent Juno a box of colored pencils which motivates Juno to send more letters to her. I personally liked this book because it emphasizes the importance of letters. Naturally this book also displayed the process of a pen-pal relationship. On top of these characteristics, the book itself is also multicultural because of the language barrier between Juno and his Korean grandmother. A good activity to go with this book is to let children form a pen-pal relationship with somebody outside of class and write letters to them. If this is not applicable, students can just write to someone in their class for their pen pal. show less