Author: Gary Soto
Illustrator: Ed Martinez
Awards: none
Grade level: 1st-3rd
This is a story about a Hispanic family on Christmas cooking Tamales for their Christmas meal. A young girl named Maria offers to help her mom in the Tamale making process, and while doing so, tries on her mother's wedding ring that her mom had taken off while making the Tamales. After many hours of making Tamales, Maria realizes her mother's wedding ring is missing from the counter. Maria's cousins arrive and she panics, and they all eat the Tamales together to try and find the mothers missing wedding ring. After no luck, Maria realizes she must confess to her mom, who turns out was wearing the wedding ring the entire time.
This is a great story that I will definitely have in my classroom. It teaches about Hispanic culture as well as giving a moral lesson that sometimes it's better, to tell the truth instead of lying. A good grade level for this is 1st-3rd because it is easy to read and they would easily be able to comprehend the story. I would use this book in my class around Christmas to show that some cultures celebrate the same holidays but have different traditions.
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