A Family Apart
Submitted by: Kristen Kavanagh
I use this book each year. We read this book along with a primary source about the Orphan Train. Students will read about a particular event in the journey (getting ready to meet the prospective parents, for example) and then read about the same event in the primary source.
They then write their own story about an orphan and put that event in their own words, practicing writing historical fiction. The orphan that they write about is named in an interesting way: the student's middle name and the name of the street they live on,,for example, my middle name is Sue and I live on Fulton Way, my character's name is Sue Fulton. Kind of a fun way to think up names that doesn't take up too much time!