FERRIS BUELLER'S DAY OFF (Paramount Pictures, 1986)

Written and directed by John Hughes; 103 minutes; comedy; MPAA rating: PG-13 ("for sexual references and language," but appropriate for ages 11 and up, if you ask me).

High school senior Ferris Bueller, a kid who gets away with everything, wants to skip school, and he wants his girlfriend, Sloane Peterson, and his uptight best friend, Cameron Frye, to join him in spending the entire day in downtown Chicago. The principal at their school, Ed Rooney, wants nothing more than to catch Ferris in the act, and the same goes for Ferris's sister, Jeanie, who really really really hates that he gets away with everything. Will he make it home in time for dinner without his parents discovering that he lied about being sick? Will Cameron ever loosen up? And will Jeanie resume her brief police-station romance with Charlie Sheen after the movie has ended? (Don't do it, girl. He's trouble.)

I saw Ferris Bueller's Day Off on video when I was 11, the year after it came out, and since I was already a big fan of the TV show Moonlighting, I was pleased as punch to see Ferris "breaking the fourth wall" just like Cybill Shepherd and Bruce Willis did. Now that I'm older, part of me wants to see Ferris taken down a peg, so I sympathize with Jeanie more than I used to, even if she is pretty much a brat. Tweens, on the other hand, will probably still thrill to Ferris's every anti-authoritarian move. On a side note, I always thought it was odd that Ferris Bueller's Day Off didn't have an accompanying soundtrack album—there are so many good songs featured in the film, including the Dream Academy's instrumental cover of the Smiths' "Please Please Please Let Me Get What I Want"—but according to an article I once read, writer-director John Hughes didn't think the songs would flow well together as a set. If only iPods had been around in 1986 ...

For further viewing, check out the defunct Nickelodeon series Ned's Declassified School Survival Guide (2004-2007) on DVD.

ROBERTO CLEMENTE: PRIDE OF THE PITTSBURGH PIRATES by Jonah Winter (2005)

Illustrated by Raúl Colón. Atheneum Books for Young Readers/Simon & Schuster; 40 pages; biography; ages 7-11; ISBN: 0-689-85643-1.

Jonah Winter’s biography of Roberto Clemente, who played baseball for the Pittsburgh Pirates for the duration of his 18 seasons in the major leagues, is a compelling portrait of a man who worked relentlessly at the sport he loved (“’If you don’t try as hard as you can,’ he said, / ‘you are wasting your life’”), using his earnings to give back to the people of his native Puerto Rico before his untimely death in a plane crash on December 31, 1972.

Winter gives his text the appearance of poetry by putting a space between every two lines, thus implying that Clemente was poetry in motion, a hitter, runner, and fielder without equal. Meanwhile, illustrator Raúl Colón alternates soft, cool watercolors with black-and-white pencil etchings, but the latter are only used when showing Clemente in his Pirates uniform, far from home and fighting to be seen as more than just a color. Fans quickly warmed to him, but “the newspaper writers did not,” Winter writes; “when Roberto got angry, / the mainly white newsmen called him a Latino ‘hothead.’”

This hint of a temper is the only negative trait Winter allows his hero, and it’s viewed merely as a byproduct of his quest to become so good at his profession that he could no longer be ignored by the world at large. Winter's message to young readers in Roberto Clemente is that success isn’t guaranteed for anyone in America, but if your work ethic is solid and you keep striving to be the best, you can ultimately prove your doubters wrong.

For further reading, check out Jonah Winter's picture books ¡Béisbol! Latino Baseball Pioneers and Legends and Fair Ball! 14 Great Stars From Baseball’s Negro Leagues, as well as the Colón-illustrated Play Ball!, New York Yankees catcher Jorge Posada's account of his childhood in Puerto Rico.

LAFCADIO, THE LION WHO SHOT BACK by Shel Silverstein (1963)

HarperCollins; 112 pages; humor; ages 9-12; ISBN: 0-06-025675-3.

An African jungle lion decides one day that he isn't going to run from the rifle-carrying hunters who are chasing him and his friends. He tries to make nice with one of them, but when the hunter tries to shoot him, the lion eats the hunter and takes his rifle. Eventually he learns how to pull the trigger with his tail and becomes an expert marksman, attracting the attention of a circus owner who names the lion Lafcadio and brings him to America. Lafcadio becomes rich and famous showing off his skills in front of circus crowds, but when he returns to the jungle years later he questions his place in the world.

Shel Silverstein narrates Lafcadio, the Lion Who Shot Back as "Uncle Shelby," a self-described "very handsome and very intelligent and very kind" man who helps Lafcadio when he arrives in America. The author fills his story with whimsical conceits, such as a suit made of marshmallows and a lion who can sign six autographs at once using his tail, teeth, and four paws, but Lafcadio and his lion friends do eat the hunters who want to shoot them, and those hunters do shoot and kill the lions who don't run away fast enough. Silverstein's book also ends on a down note, with Lafcadio facing an identity crisis—"And he didn't really know where he was going, but he did know he was going somewhere, because you really have to go somewhere, don't you?"—that will likely ring true with tween readers who feel stuck at the border between childhood and adolescence.

Older tweens may also be interested in reading Brian K. Vaughan's graphic novel Pride of Baghdad (2006), illustrated by Niko Henrichon.

T-MINUS: THE RACE TO THE MOON by Jim Ottaviani, Zander Cannon, and Kevin Cannon (2009)

Aladdin/Simon & Schuster; 124 pages; historical fiction; ages 9-13; ISBN: 978-1-4169-4960-2.

A graphic novel covering the historic race between the United States and Soviet Union to put a man on the moon, T-Minus gives equal coverage to both superpowers, culminating in the events of July 20, 1969.

Along the way readers are introduced to the men and women who made it happen, including lesser-known figures like German rocket scientist Wernher von Braun, who designed the Saturn V rocket that carried Neil Armstrong and company into outer space; Sergei Korolev, the "chief designer" of the Soviet space program; NASA engineers Caldwell "C.C." Johnson and Max Faget; and "computers," otherwise known in the USSR as Russian women who were hired for their mathematical expertise.

Jim Ottaviani, the writer of T-Minus, and Zander Cannon and Kevin Cannon, who illustrated it (and aren't related, it turns out), stuff a large amount of historical and technological information into T-Minus's 100-plus pages, so much so that at times the pace flagged because I got bogged down in explanations of acronyms such as TLI ("Trans-Lunar Injection") and GUIDO ("Guidance Officer"). If you've recently developed a casual interest in the history of space exploration, T-Minus probably isn't the place to start, but its authors show a deep respect for the attention spans of their intended tween audience, which is to be commended.

For further reading, check out Laika by Nick Abadzis (2007). And to see a Glogster-hosted advertising poster I created for T-Minus, click here.

CAMP ROCK 2: THE FINAL JAM (Disney Channel, 2010)

Directed by Paul Hoen; teleplay by Dan Berendsen, Karin Gist, and Regina Y. Hicks; 97 minutes; musical; ages 8 and up.

In this sequel to the 2008 TV movie, a new camp called Camp Star has set up shop across the lake from the beloved Camp Rock. Because the rival camp offers counselors double what they've been making at Camp Rock, a mass defection takes place. Luckily, our spunky heroes from the first film, Mitchie (Demi Lovato) and the Gray brothers (played by the three Jonas brothers), stay behind to rally their campers and prepare them for Final Jam, a contest to see which camp has the most talent. Camp Star's owner, the sleazy Axel Turner, takes it one step farther, bringing in cameras to film the competition for TV. Now everyone's focused on winning instead of the joy of creating and performing music (boo!), with Camp Rock's financial fate hanging in the balance.

I watched this one with my nieces, ages six and four, who will practically watch anything on Disney Channel if it involves teenagers. They didn't react much, but hey, it kept them quiet, and I got to enjoy that peace and quiet while mildly admiring some of the choreography during Final Jam. Camp Rock 2's story is nothing to write home about (from camp or otherwise), but its message that camp should be about making lifelong friends and finding your niche rather than being pressured to win a contest is a positive one worth reinforcing.

For further viewing, check out Disney Channel's trilogy of High School Musical movies.

THEN AGAIN, MAYBE I WON'T by Judy Blume (1971)

Yearling/Random House; 164 pages; realistic fiction; ages 9-14; ISBN: 0-440-48659-9.

A year after Are You There God? It's Me, Margaret Judy Blume published the flip-side male version. Similar to Margaret, Tony Miglione moves from a small house in Jersey City to a big one in (fictional) Rosemont, New York, after his dad, an electrician and part-time inventor, strikes it rich with a prototype for an electrical cartridge. The seventh grader enjoys certain aspects of the 'burbs, like his next-door neighbor Joel's older sister, Lisa, who undresses in front of her bedroom window but doesn't know Tony can see her from his bedroom (or does she?).

On the other hand, he hates that his mom suddenly only seems to care about impressing the Migliones' wealthy neighbors, and he really hates that their new housekeeper has banished his grandmother from the kitchen, depriving her of her main source of happiness. Tony also has to contend with Joel, who's "nice" around adults but shoplifts whenever he can in front of his new friend, which literally ties Tony's stomach in knots.

I first read Then Again, Maybe I Won't when I was in second or third grade. At that time I had no idea what a wet dream was, and I still don't think I knew by fourth grade, but age nine seems like a good entry point for new readers of Blume's classic book. Unlike Margaret and her friends, Tony doesn't talk with other boys about the changes their bodies are going through, including the erections he gets from out of nowhere during school, but his dad does try to have "the talk" with him, and much awkwardness ensues. Then Again, Maybe I Won't proved that Judy Blume could write just as incisively about the young male mind as she could about girls like Margaret and Winnie (Iggie's House).

For further reading, check out The Catcher in the Rye by J.D. Salinger (1951), featuring another male protagonist who's wary of "phonies." (Warning: for older tweens only.)

ARE YOU THERE GOD? IT'S ME, MARGARET by Judy Blume (1970)

Atheneum Books for Young Readers/Simon & Schuster; 149 pages; realistic fiction; ages 9-14; ISBN: 0-689-84158-2.

The suburb of Farbrook, New Jersey, is ex-New Yorker Margaret Simon's new home as she enters sixth grade. She quickly becomes friends with Gretchen, Janie, and Nancy, who invite her into a secret club for girls only; they create Boy Books, listing who they like the most (Philip Leroy is always number one), but mostly they talk about exercises to increase their "bust" and promise to tell each other when they get their periods. Margaret also talks to God about anything and everything, but because her father is Jewish and her mother is Christian, they haven't pressured her to choose between the two. The same can't be said for her overbearing Christian grandparents, but at least Margaret's Jewish grandmother isn't the kind to make her choose sides.

In a way Judy Blume picks up where she left off with her previous novel, Iggie's House, expanding her scope in Are You There God? It's Me, Margaret to incorporate preteen girls' concerns and curiosity about their changing bodies as well as issues of religious faith and tolerance. Blume switches from the third-person narration of Iggie's House to first-person narration in this book, causing the reader to feel Margaret's frustration right alongside her as she questions her body, her beliefs, and everything in between. I especially like how Blume portrays grandparents in her books: Margaret's Jewish grandmother treats her like a person, not a child, similar to the grandmother of Katherine, the protagonist in Blume's 1975 novel Forever.... (Please wait a few years before you tackle that book, tween readers. Having said that, I'm completely positive you won't try to find out why you should wait.)

For further reading, don't read Forever! But do check out It's Not the End of the World, Blume's 1972 novel about a girl whose parents don't have the same loving bond as Margaret's.