When I have heard of Uri Shulevitz’s most recent children’s book, I was excited at reading this book! “How I Learned Geography” is a Caldecott Honor book by Uri Shulevitz that details author Uri Shulevitz’s experiences as a young Polish refugee during World War II and how he lived in Kazakhstan and how a map made him realize the beauty of the world. “How I Learned Geography” is a truly brilliant book for children who want to learn about author Uri Shulevitz’s life during World War II and want to More...

Your story is your own, and when you choose to share it with the world you may find it hard to stop. There is no subject you are better familiar with, of course. Human beings can write diaries with a lifetime’s worth of memories. They can pen autobiographies that go from cradle to near grave and still find enough information for a couple thousand pages more. Maybe that’s why I have so much respect for the picture book autobiography. Particularly when it's not even a look at an entire life, but a More...

Imagine your life being so upheaved that you find yourself living in a strange land, with a family you don't know, with little or nothing to eat, and only your imagination to keep you company. Knowing this is a true story makes it all the more poignant. The pictures are incredible as is most of Uri's, and are the perfect complement to the sparse text. The author's note lends credibility and is fascinatingly informative. Loved it! Caldecott honor winner.

This is a story based on the author's own experience as a child. As a child war was going on all around and Father brings home a map instead of bread to eat. What good is a map? Read it to find out!

I picked up this book and the moment I started reading it, I was hooked up. The kids starts saying how they had to leave their homeland because of war and how he got mad at his dad because, one day, instead of buying dinner, he spent the money on a map. Up to that moment, I thought the book was interesting and I thought the daydreaming was inspiring. However, it wasn't until I got until the very end where the books moves on to another level. The ending is unexpected and moving in a way that I do More...

Audience: I think this book would be good for 1st grades through 3graders. The vocabulary in the book can be tricky at times. I think it would work best for the teacher to read it to the class.

Appeal: The cover is exciting to young students. It shows a kid flying over water and towards an island. The pictures in the book are colorful and detailed. The book describes things that most children have not seen, like “houses made of clay, straw, and camel dung” and temples. Young students may find th More...

How I Learned Geography
By Uri Shulevitz
Caldecott Honor Book 2009

Shulevitz, U. (2008). How i learned geography. New York, NY: Farrar, Straus and Giroux (BYR).

1. Traditional Literature- Juvenile Picture Book

2. This story is about a little boy and his family living in poverty in a new country. Food is scarce for this family. One day his father went to the market to get bread for his family. However, when he returned he did not have bread but a map. The map was hung in the family’s house and the boy More...

A young boy and his family flee their country and live in poverty. One night his father leaves to buy bread for supper. After many hours, he returns without food, but with a giant world map instead. The boy is furious and vows never to forgive his father. He soon finds though that while his father neglected to feed his stomach that night, he fed the boy's imagination as the map allows him to journey to distant lands where the boy can imagine himself happy and well fed.

Illustrations use color in More...

How I Learned Geography by Uri Shulevitz is about a young boy and his family. They flee from Poland when the Warsaw blitz occurred in 1939 to Central Asia. The boy talks about how they sleep on a dirt floor and food is very scarce. The father is sent to but bread and comes back with a map. The boy is so upset with his father and does not think he will ever forgive him for buying a map instead of the bread. He begins to stare at the map and goes on an adventure in it. He visits all kinds of place More...

How I Learned Geography by Uri Shulevitz was a great book. The book is a non-fiction story about the author himself. He and his family fled Poland when the Warsaw blitz occurred in 1939 to Central Asia where post of this story takes place. Food is very scarce where they are and his father is sent out to buy bread but comes back with a map instead. At first in the story he is so mad at his father because he was so hungry but after starring at the map and going on an adventure in it, he understand More...

This story is based on the author's own boyhood when his family had to flee war-torn Poland at the onset of WWII and how one evening his father purchased a map, instead of bread, to bring home to their somber camp. At first, Uri and his mother are upset that all they have is a map while their roommates enjoy dinner. Yet, soon they begin to realize that father has brought home food for the spirit, as Uri daydreams over the map, imagining himself in many wonderful places far away from their somber More...

In How I learned Geography by Uri Shulevitz we learn of a family who lived in the middle east of Turkestan. A four year old boy tells his story of how he and his family lived right after the Warsay blitz occurred in 1939. The boy first tells of the war and how it devastated the land, property, and possessions. He fled for safety with his mother and his father. They traveled by foot, with only the clothes they were wearing and ended up in Turkestan, where the boy saw houses mad of clay and camel More...

How I Learned Geography, by Uri Shulvitz, is the story of a family who flees their homeland during the devastation of World War II. They move to a far away and strange country where they live in poverty. The father goes out to buy some bread for his starving family, but instead he comes home with a map. The boy is so angry that his father did not get any food that he can barely sleep. The next day they hang up the map, and the boy escapes into a dream world where he travels all over the world. H More...

Title: How I learned Geography
Author: Uri Shulevitz
Illustrator: Uri Shulevitz
Publisher: Farrar Straus Giroux
Publishing Date: 2008
ISBN Number: 978-0-374-33499-4

Summary: This is the story of a family during World War II. They are refugees living with very little shelter, food, and clothing. The father goes to try and buy some bread with the only money they have. He returns with a large wall map and very little bread. The boy and mother are upset and angry and very hungry. The boy begins to see w More...

How I Learned Geography was intended for children in grades 2-5. In this story a young boy and his family leave Poland and move to Turkestan. Here his family struggles to make money. One day the boy's father was supposed to come home with food, but instead comes home with a map. Although the boy and his mother are upset because they were so hungry, they decide to hang the large map on the wall. In the days and weeks that follow the young boy dreams of places he could go on the map. He even memor More...

How I Learned Geography by Uri Shulevitz is a very personal picturebook autobiography based on childhood memories of World War II, when Shulevitz's family fled Poland and lived in safety, security and poverty in Turkestan (now Kazakhstan). Shulevitz relates his father's decision to buy a map instead of bread for supper, which initially produces anger and frustration. Soon, the map fires his artistic imagination, provides an escape from their conditions, and changes his life.

The text features sh More...

This is a surprising, moving story. For ages 9 and up, the author/illustrator tells a deeply emotional story in a subtle style that lifts the reader’s spirits above the harsh circumstances. Like the biography of John Coltrane that I read this week, the author chooses to set aside most of the grim details and instead makes the triumph over adversity his focus. The author tells of his family’s displacement during World War II and living as a child without a place of their own, without any belongs, More...

This story is based on the childhood of Shulevits and his memories of fleeing Poland with his family to the Soviet Union and Turkestan. His artistic ability is astounding and he does an amazing job of showing the contrast between realistic replications of the country and towns and the "wishful adventure" the boy imagines in the story. Shulevits illustrations appeal to children because they are colorful, but not to bold and bright, and he used soft edges and fading so they are not overpowering. P More...

This is an autobiographical picture book - young Uri and his family are Jewish refugees during WWII, fleeing from Warsaw to Turkestan. Food and money are scarce, and one night Uri's father brings home a map instead of dinner. Young Uri is angry (and hungry), but eventually the map becomes an escape for him - a way to learn about the world and to imagine a way out of his situation and into far-off lands.
It is a great story about the importance of imagination and education, but I think if I were More...

Being fascinated with geography I found this book very enjoyable. The author includes enough detail to give the reader a glimpse into his childhood experiences with war and hunger without being graphic or inappropriate in any way. I found the illustrations very expressive. The red and black for war, the sand for homes, and the bright colored clothing for the people. The way Shulevitz used neutral colors to represent the he his family was living before they got the map makes a nice contrast to th More...

A moving and emotionally affecting story (based on the author's own boyhood, his family's escape from Nazi-occupied Poland to Central Asia), How I Learned Geography (written and illustrated by Uri Shulevitz) not only poignantly demonstrates the ravages of war, of being a refugee with scant resources for food and other basic necessities many of us take for granted, the book also shows how one special object (in this case, a map of the world that the young boy's father buys instead of purchasing b More...

Author: Uri Shulevitz

Illustrator: Uri Shulevitz

Genre: fictional picture book (some historical aspects included)

Publication Info: Farrar, Straus, & Giroux (2008)

Reading Level: Ages 6-10; late early, transitional

Topic/Theme: geography, war, middle eastern culture

Issues Addressed: escape from war zones, a family's need for education as well as food during time of crisis

Social Issues: this book was based on the author's life during the Warsaw blitz in 1939, it addresses the idea of refugees More...

When I first set out to rate How I Learned Geography I was torn - several respected peers were blown away by this book while my original response was "meh" - it was just so "good for you" - but as I looked more deeply at the book and its illustrations, my appreciation of them just kept growing.

Shulevitz's illustrations, done in collage, pen and ink, and watercolor, simply glow and they're filled with so much texture that you expect to feel it on the page. He keeps his compositions changing from More...

This is Uri Shulevitz's 4th Caldecott Honor - previously he was honored for Fool of the World by Arthur Ransome, Snow and Treasure. The only reason I can see that this book didn't win the medal itself is that the illustrations and text in this book work so beautifully together, that one could not stand alone without the other. It is a personal story, based on the author’s own family's history, a bleak history of Polish refugees during WWII, who escape to a strange country with only the clothes More...

Here is another picture book biography, sure to be compared to The Wall by Peter Sis. But this one is simpler. When Uri is only 4 or 5, his family leaves war-torn Warsaw to move to Turkestan (now Kazakhstan), where they live with very little money or food. In fact, one day his father goes out to buy bread, but instead buys a map. Though the family goes to bed hungry that night, "our cheerless room was flooded with color." The map sparks many imagined adventures for Uri, and offers him an escape More...

How I Learned to Read is a story based on the author's own experiences as a child being a Polish refugee during World War II while living in Kazakhstan. While his father was set out to the market to buy food he instead came home with a map. At first he was mad at his father; however he soon became infatuated with the map and forgave his father.

This book has fun cartoon style illustrations that are full of color. How I learned to Read does a great job of listing a lot of different places around t More...

The use of color is magnificent. The story of a young refuge from Poland in World War II forced to flee his homeland for Russia. Living in dire poverty with barely enough food . One day the father goes to buy a loaf of bread, he instead buys a map of the world.

At first the boy is disappointed and hungry, but as his fascination with the map and the magical adventures it opens to the imagination he realizes his father is, indeed wise.

In the “real” world the colors are muted earth tones, but as the More...

My Impression:
The collage, watercolor, and ink illustrations made me feel like I too had traveled "far, far east to another country..." in this beautiful book.

The tone of the story is at first sad, but emotionally appropriate for children. It's straightforward in its descriptions of hardship caused by fleeing Europe during WWII, such as living with strangers, not having books or toys, and the shortage of food. These descriptions quickly lead to the heart of the story, the day his father brings More...

I liked that this book was a quick, easy read. Even more so than that, I loved the theme. I believe the author wanted to remind his readers that during the most difficult hardships there is always a way to find something positive to occupy our minds. This book also teaches children about imagination. The main character is a little boy whose family was forced out of their country because of war. He finds himself (along with his parents) in a new country, in the home of a stranger, without any foo More...