Number the Stars:
World War II Literature Unit
This is an excellent book to use with a study of World War II and/or the Holocaust. This book stands out from the rest because of its insight into the courage of the people that helped the Jews escape the Nazis.
Book Summary:
Annemarie is a ten-year-old girl in Nazi-occupied Copenhagen. She finds the courage to help her Jewish friends escape danger. The book won the 1990 Newbery Award and is suitable for grades fourth through eighth.
About the Author:
Lois Lowry was born on 20 March 1937 in Hawaii. Her father was a career army officer, and her family moved many, many times as she was growing up. At seventeen years of age she decided to begin her writing career as she went to school at Brown University.
Suggested Vocabulary:
lanky
obstinate
trousseau
ration
kroner
swastika
curfew
exaxperated
synagogue
staccato
condescending
typhus
tantalize
permeate
Activities and Questions:
1. On a world map, locate and mark the following: the Baltic Sea, Belgium, Copenhagen, Denmark, France, Holland, the North Sea, Norway, Ryvangen, Sweden, and Tivoli (Italy).
2. Pretend you are Annemarie and write a letter to Ellen after the war is over.
3. Why did Annemarie feel contempt for the German soldiers?
4. Why do you think Mrs. Rosen told the girls not to give the soldiers any reason to remember their faces?
5. How had life changed for Annemarie and her family since the German occupation of their homeland?
6. Why did Ellen come to stay with Annemarie?
7. What did Uncle Henrik mean when he said, “It is much easier to be brave if you do not know everything?”
8. Do you think Ellen and Annemarie will ever see each other again?
9. How did Annemarie’s sister, Lise, die?
10. Why do you think that Uncle Henrik and Annemarie’s mother made up the death of a fictitious great-aunt Birte?
