Am I a Color Too? By Heidi Cole and Nancy Vogl

I am a Human Being,
Not a color, not a word.
I have my hopes and dreams
And a voice that will be heard.

To find out more about this book visit the official website.
Buy "Am I a Color Too?" here.

In this story, a young boy grapples with his identity. He hears people say that his father is Black and his mother is White. He wonders, "Am I a color too?" Throughout the book, this young man thinks about the people he sees everyday and their colors. He comes to realize that he is not a color, but a person named Tyler. In the end, Tyler understands that people aren't words, they are individuals who have similarities and differences.

I very much enjoyed reading this book. Not only is the story one that children who are racially mixed can identify with, but the illustrations alone are reason enough to read "Am I a Color Too?" The beautiful, realistic drawings represent diverse ethnicities. The book's rhyming pattern makes it an appropriate read aloud book for children as young as 4 or 5. "Am I a Color Too?" could be used as a point of reference for an "All About Me" unit. It serves as a way to learn about children who are diverse in their ethnicity.

Within the domains of social justice, this book mainly touches upon the first two stages of "Self-Love and Acceptance" and "Respect for Others." Tyler learns to love himself for who he is and doesn't get caught up with identifying himself as a particular color or word. The people that he sees are of diverse races and he accepts them for and celebrates their similarities and differences. The third stage of "Exploring Issues of Social Justice" is subtly addressed within one page of the book. An illustration shows Tyler sitting under a table that is flooded with boxes labeled "Mixed", "Other", "Mulatto", "Bi-Racial", "White", "Black", and "Human Being". Students can explore the meanings of the these words and their affect on people's feelings.

If America Were a Village

If America Were a Village: A Book about the People of the United States

by David J. Smith

(available in bookstores and amazon.com)

Smith decreased the number of Americans in the United States from 306 million to 100 people. He broke down the population so America became a village of 100, and he gave figures and facts that were easier to understand. "In this village: 75 are white, 12 are black...82 speak English as their first language..." He talks about race, language, religions, jobs, ages, wealth, energy use and health. As I was reading the book, I was fascinated by the amazing facts I was unaware of.

This book falls into step 1 and 2 of the social justice education. The students develop love and acceptance for themselves and others. Through this book, they will learn to appreciate the diversity around them. Teachers can use this book in math to teach statistics, ratio, and facts. Students can study the population of United States and explore diversity.

As a fun activity, the students can create their own book "If Our School Were a Village." They can survey and collect data on students' race and langauge. Instead of collecting data on wealth and religion, they can survey their favorite foods, TV shows, sports, and other topics that students are interested in finding.

The Music of Dolphins By Karen Hesse

This book is a fairly sophisticated and complex story about a young teenage girl named Mila who has been living in a secluded location with dolphins for most of her life. She is eventually discovered, taken to a research facility against her will, and scientists attempt to teach Mila the English language as well as other American customs. Mila progresses quickly and is eager to learn, but struggles with adapting to the different environment she finds herself in. She longs for her home, the language and traditions she’s familiar with, and the dolphin family she left behind. Although Mila is amazed by all the things this new world has to offer her, she wishes to go back to the ocean where she believes she genuinely belongs.
I like this book because I believe it address many important themes and issues regarding conformity and cultural differences. It may appear that this book is not relevant to a social justice curriculum but Mila’s dolphin culture is very distinct and is constantly being dismissed as not legitimate throughout the book, speaking very realistically to our current society. Also in my experience, students really enjoy reading this book because its written as a series of diary entries written by Mila that become increasingly more sophisticated as Mila attains more language skills.
I used this book before with advanced readers from a fourth grade class. We read the book for a book club and the students and I were able to thoroughly and meaningfully connect the themes raised in the book to current issues in society and significant events in the past. We discussed why people in the book didn’t acknowledge Mila’s dolphin culture and how Mila’s abduction and forced conformity to the dominant culture is similar to other events in history such as slavery. When used in this way, this book can definitely be integrated into a social justice unit.

For more information visit: http://books.google.com/books?id=sNOL2J3zNVEC&printsec=frontcover&dq=the+music+of+dolphins&source=bl&ots=6tIKKGbAQD&sig=tIRH2_dAPm1eIPVHp8m-mEdufOg&hl=en&ei=ro9vS67UCc-XtgfHkrSEBg&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=1&ved=0CA0Q6AEwAA#v=onepage&q=&f=false

The Other Side By Jacqueline Woodson

http://www.amazon.com/Other-Side-Jacqueline-Woodson/dp/0399231161

https://www.discountbooksale.com/store/productView.aspx?idProduct=15165&ec=1&ProdId=112&AWTrck=1038137580&utm_source=google&utm_medium=cpc&utm_term=the%20other%20side%20woodson&utm_campaign=acc010-0237&b=GGL_DBS_1

This book showcases a very simplistic story about a black and white girl who must overcome the stifling effect of racism in childhood. A fence separates the town into two sides, one side for blacks and the other side for whites. Although the girls are advised to never go to the other side, they decide that sitting on the fence isn’t going against the rules, leading them to become friends with one another. By the end of the story Annie says, “Someday somebody’s going to come along and knock this old fence down” which is the most important line of the book that easily leads the teacher into the third and fourth domain of sje. The teacher can focus on people in history who have knocked the “fence” [racism] down and could also encourage social action within the children by asking how they could knock the fence down. This book also promotes respect between black and white students. What I liked most about the book is how simple the message of racism comes through; making it easy to use with younger children without disturbing them. This book is excellent for studying literary elements such as symbolism [the fence] and for teaching literacy lessons through read alouds. Also, weather is a major component of the book and can be used as part of the science curricula.

White Socks Only

White Socks Only

By: Evelyn Coleman

Illustrations by Tyrone Geter

available: http://www.amazon.com/White-Socks-Only-Evelyn-Coleman/dp/080758956X

White Socks Only is a flashback story told by a Grandma to a little girl. The grandma chronicles her journey into town on a hot day when she took eggs to see if they could fry on the sidewalk. The little girl hid the eggs on her sides, and one had broken, but she did make it to crack one and see it fry. However, it was such a hot day and she was covered in eggs, so she wanted a drink of water. She saw a white only fountain, so she took her shoes off and took a drink wearing her white socks. Of course, a white man came by and scolded the little girl. However, a woman from her church and other members of the Black community came up and supported her by drinking out of the fountain as well.

I like this book because it shows how people can band together to create change. I also like the subtle humor of the little girl taking off her shoes and using white socks. I also like the stock character sense that is created by the Big white man and the Chicken man. I think there are problems because this book makes it seem like it was SO easy to create change, when we know that people had to work a lot harder. We also might explore how the Chicken man may or may not perform Voodoo, which could be why the whites seem fearful of him.

I would use this book as a read-aloud. I might even include it in my science units because of the idea of frying an egg on the sidewalk when its hot.

This book falls into the domains of SJE exploring issues of social justice, and social movements and change.

It would fall nicely into a literature unit about stock characters. It would also fall nicely into a literature unit introducing the idea of symbolism and allegory. It would also even introduce the technique of flashback.

The Librarian of Basra: A True Story from Iraq

The Librarian of Basra: A True Story from Iraq

Written and Illustrated by Jeanette Winter

Summary:

Alia Muhammas Baker is the chief librarian of Basra, Iraq's central library. When Alia hears of the impending war in Basra, she worries her library will be destroyed in the fighting. Determined to save the books, "which are more precious to her than mountains of gold," Alia works to secretly transfer over 30,000 books from the library to safer areas, such as a nearby restaurant, the homes of friends, scattered throughout the community. Alia rescues the books just in time, as nine days later the library is destroyed. With the books now in safe keeping, Alia patiently waits for the war to end, as she dreams of a new library.

This book can be integrated into several areas of study:

Math: Students can focus on the books transferred. May have students place books in equal groupings and 'spread'

throughout town in a certain number of trips. Can give students dimensions of houses, and have students apply area formulas to decide how many books could fit in each house, etc.

Social Studies: Study the geography of the Middle East, of Iraq, of Basra; the restricted roles of women in some regions of the country; the various cultures of the region; The importance and value of books in society - the knowledge and history they contain; Learning more about the story of Alia and read interviews with her, learn about how and why the author chose

to write the book, etc.

Domains of Social Justice Education:

The Librarian of Basra has a strong focus on:

Step 3: Exploring issues of Social Justice

Step 4: Social Movement and Social Change

These are two areas that student can delve deeper into, and begin to study and explore how forms of oppression are confronted and how people have struggled to social change. In addition, students may want to fundraise money, to help the book's publishing company, Harcourt, who is donating a portion of the proceeds from the sale of the book to a special American Library Association fund set up to help buy books for Basra's Central Library, which is still awaiting funding to be rebuilt.

Don't Say Ain't

Don't Say Ain't

by: Irene Smalls

Illustrated by Colin Bootman

Don't Say Ain't is about a little girl, Dana, who lives with her Godmother. She has two best girlfriends, with whom she likes to play double-dutch. Dana gets into an advanced school, and soon learns that there are certain ways to behave and speak in school. Her friends from her neighborhood stop speaking to her, and Dana is very confused. Then Dana's teacher comes to visit their home, and she is speaking just like Dana and her Godmother and friends, and she becomes equally confused. She then tries desperately to get her friends to speak to her again, to no avail. It is not until Dana learns that she can do well at school, but still have fun with her friends that she is happy again!

available via amazon, although I found it in a great little children's store in East Harlem called Grandma's Place:

http://www.amazon.com/Dont-Say-Aint-Irene-Smalls/dp/157091382X

Reflection:

I like this story because of the way the little girls' friendship is tested. I also like the way it can allow us to think about the uses of language and for older kids, the notion of "acting white". It also of course talks about how we can all have multiple sides to our personalities. It also speaks about the ability of a good school to change the outcome of your life.

I think this story is really a read-aloud book. The book is kind of difficult to digest, but it might also work in small book groups. I think it is a good way to talk about families, interpersonal relationships, and perhaps introduce past-times into the classroom, like double-dutch.

I think this book falls into Self-Love and Acceptance. It also speaks a little bit about respect for others. The book itself does not explore the issues of social justice in an upfront manner, but with a class discussion the stereotypes of attending a good school, and the marginalization of Ebonics by non-Blacks can be confronted.

It doesn't really connect to any curricular units that are already in place from the DOE, however, I think with a little creativity you could fit it in really nicely to some. Perhaps character study and the use of dialogue in stories might be best.

This book spoke to me personally because I had moved from a neighborhood school to a gifted talented program. I experienced how it is really hard to maintain friendships with people if you are in limbo between socio-economic groups. This also could be a similar experience for any student who does not "fit" into a category of oppression perfectly.

Samantha Reed