The Family Under The Bridge By Natalie Savage Carlson

Reading Level: 4-5
Genre: Multicultural
Awards: Newberry Honor Book

This book is about a group of homeless children that live under a bridge and the man that they end up latching themselves to and creating a family with.  The children's mother is less than thrilled about this arrangement or the adventures they get up to but she has no choice in the matter.  The story is set in Paris, France and the children and the man that they befriend, Armand have many adventures around the city.  One time they meet a band of gypsies and Suzy thinks she is going to teach Tinka, one of the gypsies how to read, but in the end she and the other children end up learning something from the gypsies and Tinka in particular teaches Suzy the "gypsies alphabet" which is a set of symbols that the gypsies read to know where to beg.

I think that this story is a great story about seeing more in people than just their status in life would make them out to be.  It is also about forming a family with whoever is there for you when you need them.  With this book I would have the student's talk about what makes a family and how they classify what a family is.  Then I would have them write a paper about who their "family" consists of and have them give reasoning for their choices.  This could be turned into a project with the students creating a scrapbook or family album or even a family tree with their non-biological family being put on the tree as well.