The workbook to The Grove of 100 Wishes, by Iris Pelton-Hamlett and April Lynn Pelton, is designed to provide tips and tools for educators and parents to help children enhance their literary skills, while learning about additional social and emotional strategies that they can adopt for everyday life. The workbook is divided into three sections: Social and Emotional Learning; Revising and Editing; and Plot Development and Literary Elements.

Social and Emotional Learning contains Having Character Counts; I Have Character; I’m Developing Character; Bullying is Not OK; Put a Stop to Bullying!; Kindness can Stop Bullying – Ayanna Won by Being Kind!; a Pledge to Stop Bullying; Kindness Matters!; Kindness is the Key; Put Up and Put Downs; and a Kindness Scavenger Hunt. Revising and Editing focuses on improving writing skills by looking at the organization of ideas, grammar, and strategies to make a story more interesting for the reader. The section consists of a description of the Revising Strategy, ROAD (Replace, Organize, Add, and

Delete); Revising and Editing Tips (Common Grammar Mistakes: “Quotations can be Tricky”; Take a Break Using Commas; Side Note on Capitalization; “Don’t Keep Running Your Mouth” – Run-On Sentences; “Putting Others First by Being Polite”; “Where is Your Writing Leading the Reader? Check the ROAD or Pathway; USE [CAUTION] ROAD; First Draft; Second Draft; and Final Draft. Plot Development and Literary Elements contains Parts of a Story; Plot Development: Rising Action, Exposition, Climax, Falling Action, Resolution, and Theme; and Analyze the Characters. Each section contains concepts and ideas present in The Grove of 100 Wishes that relate to reading, writing, and the building of strong character traits in youth, with the focus on developing the whole child.

The content of The Grove of 100 Wishes Workbook is quite detailed and it certainly gives value for money. One really does need to have access to The Grove of 100 Wishes if one is to make the most of this workbook, as the links between the two volumes are strong, including many references to the main characters of Ade’, Ada, and Ayanna. However, such linkages make this workbook all the more interesting. The contents are also fairly advanced, and definitely require the input of an educator or adult caregiver for a child to be able to gain the full benefit of the text. The activities are all most age-appropriate, though, and should keep any child busy for hours. A joyful guide and one that really should be bought together with The Grove of 100 Wishes for the child reader to gain maximum benefits from both texts.