First Grade

DAVID lived on an island on the coast of South Carolina. It was the first day of school and David was in first grade. The island schoolhouse, that had looked so empty and desolate all summer long, with tall grass growing in the schoolyard, was now brimming over with children. The grass was cut, and the big windows were opened wide.David sat at his own desk, in his own chair. The mothers who had brought their children to school had all gone away, David's mother, too. And now it was Miss Joyce, the teacher, whom David must mind.The story tells of David's experiences in First Grade - learning how to write his name on the blackboard, making friends, doing the things that a first-grader does. The story also tells of David's younger brother Timothy, who watches what David does, and can't wait to join him in school, which he does towards the end of the book.The boys have many adventures. They make Jack-O'Lanterns and dress as ghosts for Halloween, adopt a stray dog they name Spot, catch tree-frogs, toads, and a large land turtle, called a "Cooter," build a playhouse, catch crabs in a creek, and plant a garden - something that both boys had always wanted. David and Timothy's father is away in the Army, so the boys' family consists of their mother and her aunt Beulah, from Philadelphia, whom the boys call Aunt Beulah. Their home is called "Oak Farm," a rather fancy name, but it is really just an ordinary house. Both boys want it to become a real farm, and little by little it does become more and more like a real farm with the addition of rabbits and plans to raise chickens. Much more happens during the story as the reader will find out.
About the Author: Eleanor Frances Lattimore was born in China where her father and mother had gone to teach English at a Chinese government university. Eleanor was the fourth of five children. Eleanor was especially close to her sister, Isabel, who was only two years older. From the time Eleanor was four or five years old, she and Isabel cut out paper dolls, colored them, gave them each a name, and wrote stories about them. They collected these stories in little homemade books. Both girls were sure, even then, that they wanted to be artists when they grew up. The Lattimore family returned to the United States in 1920, when Isabel was 18 and Eleanor 16. Isabel and Eleanor studied art in Oakland, California, for a year before joining their parents in Hanover, New Hampshire, where their father was now teaching at Dartmouth College. Eleanor studied art in New York City and Boston and worked for several years in New York City as a freelance artist, designing greeting cards and Christmas cards and illustrating books for children. One day Eleanor went to see a children's book editor to see if she had any work for her to do. The editor especially liked Eleanor's drawings of little Chinese children. "It's too bad we don't have a book about a little Chinese child," she said, "because if we did I'd want you to illustrate it." Eleanor took this as an invitation for her to write a book! So she she wrote a book about a mischievous little Chinese boy named "Little Pear." Little Pear was published in 1931 and it is still in print, 84 years later. Altogether, Eleanor published 57 books between 1931 and 1978. There were three more books about Little Pear - Little Pear and his Friends (1934), Little Pear and the Rabbits (1956) and More About Little Pear (1971). Most of Eleanor Frances Lattimore's books are written for children in second and third grade. They are about things that happen in everyday life: falling in the water, losing a key and getting it back, getting to know a cousin from another part of the country, and so on. Many of her books are set in China. Others are set in places where she lived. Eleanor Frances Lattimore married Robert Armstrong Andrews in 1934 and they had two sons, Peter (1936) and Michael (1938). Many of her books are loosely based on the adventures of her children and grandchildren. First Grade (1944) is based on the adventures of Peter and Michael and their friends when Peter was in first grade on Edisto Island, South Carolina.