Since February is Black History Month, I chose two books related to the trials people of African-American descent suffered prior to the Civil Rights movement in the 1960's.
K-2 heard the story "Most Loved in All the World" by Tonya Hegamin. Since this book is also a Beehive Nominee for 2011, the students were able to vote on how well they liked this book.
"Most Loved in All the World" is about a young slave girl who watches her mother suffer day after day in the cotton fields. She rubs salve in her mother's cut hands and whipped back. When he mother has time away from the fields, she works on a quilt, and as she sews, she tells her daughter what the blocks on the quilt mean. The child is too young to understand that her mother works with the Underground Railroad to set as many slaves free as she can. Finally, one night, the mother sends her daughter off with the others, but she has to stay and continue her fight for freedom. Before she sends the daughter away, she gives her the quilt she has stitched, and the blocks will guide her to freedom. In the center is a block which means "this child is most loved in all the world." A heart-wrenching story, this book reveals one of the many sacrifices freedom fighters made--"These folks saw slaver as an all-out war; they lived by the strict codes of true soldiers." -Tonya Hegamin (author's notes).
3-6 heard from one of my favorite books, "Maniac Magee," by Jerry Spinelli. This novel is set during a time of segregation, and the theme of two separate worlds is present throughout the novel. Jeffrey "Maniac" Magee loses his parents in a tragic accident and is sent to live with his aunt and uncle, who pretty much hate each other. Rather than get divorced, the aunt and uncle live in separate parts of the house and spend separate time with Jeffrey. This situation doesn't sit well with Jeffrey, and he decides to run away. He stops running in a city called Two Mills, where the people living on the East End are black, and the West Enders are white. Jeffrey is taken in by a family on the East End, and fits in perfectly with them, though not all the neighbors understand. This wonderful book reads like poetry--the descriptions are lyrical and rich in sensation. Here is one of my favorite paragraphs:
"For the life of him, he couldn't figure out why these East Enders called themselves black. He kept looking and looking, and the colors he found were gingersnap and light fudge and dark fudge and acorn and butter rum and cinnamon and burnt orange."
And another:
"He especially loved the warm brown of Mrs. Beale's thumb, as it appeared from under creamy white icing that she allowed him to lick away when she was frosting his favorite cake."
Okay, one more:
"By the time Maniac and the rest of the vacant lot regulars got there, Chestnut and Green was a cross between a block party and a swimming pool. Radios blaring. People blaring. Somebody selling lemonade. Somebody selling Kool-Aid ice cubes on toothpicks. Bodies. Skin. Colors. Water. Gleaming. Buttery. Warm. Cool. Wet. Screaming. Happy."
Utterly moving and beautiful, this Newberry Medal winner gives new insight to what it means to accept people for who they are, and not judge them based on any superficial detail. Read this one with your kids!
