Platform 9 3/4

Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone  - J.K. Rowling

Publisher: Bloomsbury

Copyright: 1997

Pages: 320

This is the first book in the Harry Potter series and the reading level of it is around grades 5-6. Even though this book is classified more as a children's book, a lot of adults (of any age) love to read them too. All of the Harry Potter books are classified as fantasy books. They are great reads that take you to another magical world that really entrances you.

Summary

Harry Potter knows nothing about being a wizard or anything about magic in general. The only thing he knows is life with the Dursley's, his aunt and uncle who had to take care of him when his parent's died. Everything changes the day that he receives a letter, or two, from Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. Even though the Dursley's aren't keen on letting him leave, Harry is overwhelmed with excitement to leave them behind. This is the start of the rest of his life!

Book Use

This book is a great one for students because it is full of twists, turns, and tons of magic. I think that this book would be really good to use in the classroom because it can be used in a ton of different ways. It can be used for creativity of drawing illustrations for parts of the book, or the language that is used within. I really like the words that she uses because it gives us a really good picture of what is going on and the imagery is very vivid. Since poetry is a subject that can be hard for students to get into, why not pair it up with a book that's exciting and fun? In the classroom I would get them to create magic poetry. It can be like a spell book, but for poetry, This will catch their attention and also get them thinking about the vocabulary that was used in the book to work into their poetry. They would need to use at least 10 "magical" words from the book. I want them to make this look like a spell book because then it also gets them using the imagery within the book to create a cover of their own poetry. This combines poetry and mind pictures together which I think is a great way to connect this story to their learning.

                                      <3<3<3                     <3<3                        <3                          No <3

Rating System
Theme	If the theme is well developed and the message is portrayed very clearly.	The theme makes sense; however, it could be more developed.	The message is hard to find in the story and there isn’t much of a theme to go off of.	There isn’t a theme at all.
Plot	The plot is very well developed and everything flows smoothly.	The plot has a few gaps, but the story still is capable of moving along.	The plot has gaps that makes it hard to move the story along.	There is no plot in this book.
Characters	All the characters are developed well in the story.	There is more detail that could be added to the characters.	Characters are very poorly developed.	Characters aren’t developed at all.
Setting	The setting is described in detail and is necessary for the story to make sense.	The setting is described alright and still is needed to help the story make sense.	The setting is described alright, but it isn’t needed to help the story move along.	The setting provided is not necessary for the story to occur.
Illustrations	The illustrations are very detailed and help move the story along.	The illustrations are good, but don’t help the story move along.	The illustrations aren’t the best.	There are no meaningful illustrations at all.

Theme <3<3<3 - I gave this book three hearts for theme because there is so much that can be taken out of this book and all of them are well developed. Friendship is one that can be seen clearly throughout this book as well as the ones in the rest of the series.

Plot <3<3<3 - The plot is very realistic in the timeline that it takes. Every kid can relate to it in some way because it is school and there are always those mean kids that pick on you. There are also those teachers that students think are weird, mean, or smelly. This book portrays the life of students everywhere in a great way as well as adding the interest of magic into it.

Characters <3<3<3 - All of the characters within this book are well developed and create a good connection throughout. These characters help develop the story very well and it keeps people interested because there are twists and turns throughout the entire book.

Setting <3<3<3 - I think that the setting is very clever and extremely cool. A lot of kids wish that they could go to school in a magical castle and I think that the setting couldn't be more perfect. It is necessary for the story to move along and to make the connections that it does with the readers.

Illustrations <3 - The front illustration on the book is very good and insightful as what is to come, however, this book is a chapter book so there are no other illustrations seen throughout which is why I only gave it one heart. 

I would definitely recommend this book because it is just such a great story full of mystery and magic!