# Sarah, Plain and Tall

**Author:** Patricia MacLachlan
**Lexile:** 660L
**Grade range:** Grades 3–5
**Age range:** 8–11
**First published:** 1985
**Page count:** 58
**Genre:** Historical Fiction (Middle Grade)
**ISBN-13:** `9780064402057`
**ISBN-10:** `0064402053`
**Canonical URL:** https://readinglist.school/book/sarah-plain-and-tall
**License:** [CC BY 4.0](https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/) — please credit ReadingList.school when citing.

## About this book

Two children on a prairie farm in the 1890s anxiously wait to meet Sarah, the woman who has answered their widowed father's newspaper ad for a wife. MacLachlan's Newbery Medal novella is a near-universal 3rd-5th grade assignment and Common Core Appendix B exemplar.

## Themes

- family
- loss
- new beginnings
- prairie life

## Content notes

- references to a parent's death

Common Sense Media age recommendation: 7+

## Where this book is assigned

### Charlie May Simon Children's Book Award

- **recommended** · 3rd grade · Arkansas — [source: Arkansas State Library / Arkansas Literacy Association — Charlie May Simon Children's Book Award (student-choice, grades 4-6; annual since 1971)](https://library.arkansas.gov/programs/book-awards/charlie-may-simon-book-award/)
- **recommended** · 4th grade · Arkansas — [source: Arkansas State Library / Arkansas Literacy Association — Charlie May Simon Children's Book Award (student-choice, grades 4-6; annual since 1971)](https://library.arkansas.gov/programs/book-awards/charlie-may-simon-book-award/)
- **recommended** · 5th grade · Arkansas — [source: Arkansas State Library / Arkansas Literacy Association — Charlie May Simon Children's Book Award (student-choice, grades 4-6; annual since 1971)](https://library.arkansas.gov/programs/book-awards/charlie-may-simon-book-award/)

### Common Core State Standards (ELA)

- **required** · 3rd grade — [source: CCSS ELA Appendix B, grades 2-3 Newbery exemplar](https://achievethecore.org/page/2699)
- **required** · 4th grade — [source: CCSS ELA Appendix B, grades 4-5 exemplar](https://achievethecore.org/page/2699)
- **required** · 4th grade · Kansas — [source: Kansas DOE — prairie-state canon requirement](https://www.ksde.org/)

### Golden Kite Award

- **recommended** · 3rd grade — [source: Golden Kite Award (SCBWI) winners, via Wikipedia — 1986 Winner](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Golden_Kite_Award)
- **recommended** · 4th grade — [source: Golden Kite Award (SCBWI) winners, via Wikipedia — 1986 Winner](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Golden_Kite_Award)
- **recommended** · 5th grade — [source: Golden Kite Award (SCBWI) winners, via Wikipedia — 1986 Winner](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Golden_Kite_Award)

### Newbery Medal

- **recommended** · 3rd grade — [source: Newbery Medal (American Library Association), via Wikipedia — 1986 Newbery Medal winner](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Newbery_Medal)
- **recommended** · 4th grade — [source: Newbery Medal (American Library Association), via Wikipedia — 1986 Newbery Medal winner](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Newbery_Medal)
- **recommended** · 5th grade — [source: Newbery Medal (American Library Association), via Wikipedia — 1986 Newbery Medal winner](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Newbery_Medal)
- **recommended** · 6th grade — [source: Newbery Medal (American Library Association), via Wikipedia — 1986 Newbery Medal winner](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Newbery_Medal)
- **recommended** · 7th grade — [source: Newbery Medal (American Library Association), via Wikipedia — 1986 Newbery Medal winner](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Newbery_Medal)

### Scott O'Dell Award for Historical Fiction

- **recommended** · 3rd grade — [source: Scott O'Dell Award for Historical Fiction winners, via Wikipedia — 1986 Scott O'Dell Award](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scott_O%27Dell_Award_for_Historical_Fiction)
- **recommended** · 4th grade — [source: Scott O'Dell Award for Historical Fiction winners, via Wikipedia — 1986 Scott O'Dell Award](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scott_O%27Dell_Award_for_Historical_Fiction)
- **recommended** · 5th grade — [source: Scott O'Dell Award for Historical Fiction winners, via Wikipedia — 1986 Scott O'Dell Award](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scott_O%27Dell_Award_for_Historical_Fiction)

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