The Courage of Sarah Noble-Multicultural and International Literature- Chapter Book

The Courage of Sarah Noble by Alice Dalgliesh is such a great inspirational story for many. The Courage of Sarah Noble is based on a true story about an eight-year-old girl that must be brave as her dad and her take a journey to their new home.  When her dad buys new land in New Milford, near a settlement of Indians Sarah steps up to join him in his journey and be his cook while he builds their new house.  Along the way Sarah faces many challenges that she must learn to be brave through.  The first night in the woods Sarah becomes very scared when she hears all the wild animals that are also sleeping there with them.  Here dad has to keep reminding her to keep her courage and stay brave, and that he will not let anything happen to her.  The next night they find a family that allows them to stay with them for the night, but Sarah soon realizes they aren’t as nice as they seem.  The children continuously tell Sarah that the Indians are mean and are going to chop their heads off, and the mom keeps telling Sarah she is too young to be on such a journey.  Finally when Sarah and her dad arrive at their new home there is much work to be done, so while her dad is off building the new house, Sarah is making new friends with their Indian neighbors.  Finally after a great amount of time Sarah’s dad has finished the house and must go get the rest of her family while Sarah stays with her new friends Tall John and his family! In the end Sarah’s family is reunited in their new home and Sarah is now happier than ever!  This is a great story because it is based off true events and it teaches about bravery and courage and what it means to be each of those.  Also, in shows what it was like in the 1700s when people really did have to do things such as this.  I would use this book in my class to teach about courage and bravery and what each of those words mean and have students reflect on what those words meant to them and write about somebody that they found brave!  Also, it is a great way to tie in the past and how people lived back in the day when they did have to travel by foot to find new land and what it was like with Native Americans in the 1700s.  Also, because this book is based on a true story it will help students realize that children their age really did have to be brave for their families in order to survive.  This book would be great to teach about the lifestyles of Native Americans and those of a white family during that time period.  Along with writing about someone they see as brave it would be cool to have students create an acrostic poem using the word brave or courage to represent what each word means!