Cousin Trouble

Gr 4–8—A new series designed to help recent immigrants to the United States through paired high-interest fiction and nonfiction texts. Social Skills describes how to greet others, show respect, interpret body language, and understand emotions. Key words and phrases like eye contact, therapist, body language, and gesture are highlighted throughout the text. This same set of vocabulary words relating to social skills are presented in a narrative form in Cousin Trouble, a fictional story about a teen named Grace and her cousin, Calla, who is visiting from Greece. Calla struggles to adjust to life in the United States, and encounters some social difficulties at the mall and at a party. Both books, written at a first grade reading level, feature engaging, full-page photographs, along with short sentences and a controlled vocabulary. The layout makes the text highly readable and easy to digest, particularly for readers still learning English.