The Breadwinner by Deborah Ellis

Deborah Ellis was born and raised in the small Ontario town of Paris. After finishing school there, she lived in Ottawa for a while before moving to Toronto. She works in a group home for women in Toronto as a counsellor. She has always been an antiwar activist and spends her free time reading and jogging.

She wrote The Breadwinner after spending time helping out in an Afghan refugee camp. She has also written two sequels to this novel - Parvana's Jouney and Shauzia.

The story is based on the real story of a girl Ellis met in this camp, who had cut her hair and donned boy's clothing to support her family. All the royalties from sales of this book are donated to educating the Afghan girls in refugee camps in Pakistan.

(from Wikipedia)

The Breadwinner is an action-filled book from start to finish. The story is about a young Afghan girl named Parvana, who lives with her family in a bombed out apartment building. She begins her story by telling how her mom and dad were both highly educated people with degrees and that the family was once rich. When the Taliban came to power, everything in their lives changed.

Parvana's mother was a published writer but under Taliban rule, women were not allowed to work or go to school. She had to go home and couldn't go out of the house without a burqa and a male escort or a note written by a male in the house. This applied to Parvana's sister as well, but not Parvana, because she was not yet considered a woman. Parvana was happy at first when the school was closed, but she later grew to realize the significance of not having an education.

As a result, Parvana went to work with her dad in the market. He had a booth where he would translate and read letters for people. He also sold his own personal belongings for extra money. He has lost his leg and sold his wooden leg to make more money. He needed Parvana to help him to and from the market. Parvana would sit on a square mat by a window for hours and watch her dad while he worked.

At home, Parvana would fill the water buckets and help care for her siblings. One day Taliban fighters burst in and took Parvana's father away. This was quite common and people could be kept in jail without committing any crime. The next day Parvana and her mother walked to the prison and yelled at the Taliban fighters to release him, but they were beaten and had to return home. After this, her mother became very depressed. Parvana and her family needed help. This help came when Parvana's previous gym teacher, Mrs. Weira, visited their house. She saw how desperate the family was, and she returned often to help the family.

It was decided that in order for the family to survive, Parvana should cut her hair and wear her deceased brother's clothes. This was difficult at first. Parvana was both scared and mad. She was mad about her hair being cut and scared about all her new responsibilities.

At first, it was very frightening at the market for Parvana. Once, when a man went to pull a letter out of his robes, Parvana thought that he was going to shoot her. After Parvana made some money, she would go to the store to get food. Afghan women were not allowed to go into the stores, so they had to shout their orders from outside the store. However, Parvana, disguised as a boy, could now go inside the store to purchase goods.

With the ability to work in the market, Parvana was able to notice people. She thought she recognized one of the workers in the market - a tea boy. She was shocked to realize that this person was really another girl, Sauzia, from her school. This girl shared Parvana's secret and was also working as a boy to support her family. The two planned to work together selling items, but they needed money to buy a tray. They went to work collecting bones of dead bodies and selling them to a bone broker. Even though Parvana could earn more money this way, she didn't like it.

Parvana was excited to get the news of her sister, Noora's, upcoming marriage but was upset that this wedding would take place in another town that the Taliban had not taken over. If her father was freed from prison, she wanted to be home to greet him. Parvana's mom and sister went to the wedding. It was agreed that Parvana would stay home to work and wait for her father. One day, while at the house, two men knocked at the door. Her father was leaning on one of the men's shoulder. He was very weak from his prison experience.and needed a lot of time to recover. The family's friend, a former gym teacher, Mrs. Weera cared for him, while Parvana continued to work.

Parvana's life did not get easier because her dad was home. Coming home from work, Parvana found a crying women inside a bombed out building. She managed to get the women safely home where Mrs. Weira could care for her. They found out from this woman that her family had been murdered by the Taliban in the same town to which Noora and the rest of the family had gone. The Breadwinner concludes with Parvana and her dad embarking on a journey to find her mother and sister. Parvana's story continues in the sequel Parvana's Journey.

The novel study guide for The Breadwinner contains comprehension questions on each chapter as well as a list of vocabulary words found in these chapters.

There are 50 activities teachers can choose to have the students complete or the students can choose which activities they would enjoy most. These activities are designed to meet the needs of all ability levels in the classroom.

The categories of the activities are:
- Creative Writing
- Word Study
- Integrated Studies
- Research
- Grammar

Sample activities include:

Creative Writing Activity 9:
Based on news reports about refugee camps, do you think that living in one of these camps would be different than living under Taliban rule?

Write a paragraph or two to explain your answer.

Integrated Studies Activity 2:
Make a character web of Parvana.
Draw a circle in which you place the name "Parvana". Label five other
circles leading from this central one as follows:
1. relationships
2. hobbies/interests
3. appearance
4. others' opinions
5. personality
Jot down as many ideas as you can related to each topic.
When you have all your ideas in place, write a character sketch of
Parvana based on your web.

The novel study guide consists of 58 pages that include teacher record keeping sheets, assessment rubrics and the answers to the questions.