Speak Up! Listen Up!

guest post by Kathy MacMillan

What does it mean to raise your voice? It can be a lot more than screaming or shouting– it also means defending yourself or a cause you believe in. 

The women profiled in She Spoke: 14 Women Who Raised Their Voices and Changed the World, written by Kathy MacMillan and Manuela Bernardi and illustrated by Kathrin Honesta (Familius Press, 2019), faced all kinds of hardships, obstacles, and even violence – but they didn’t let those things stop them from speaking up. The book features activists Dolores Huerta, Suzan Shown Harjo, Leymah Gbowee, scientists Dr. Temple Grandin and Dr. Jane Goodall, Supreme Court Justice Sonia Sotomayor, trailblazers Shirley Chisholm, Abby Wambach, and more. The built-in sound card allows readers to hear the inspiring words of these groundbreaking women at the touch of a button.

The unique audio format of She Spoke makes it an engaging resource for the classroom, but it can be used beyond Women’s History Month! Here are some suggestions:

-After sharing each profile and audio clip, use the accompanying discussion questions to prompt your students to connect the lessons learned to their own lives. The discussion questions could be used as writing prompts or a launchpad for group discussion.

-Discuss how hearing the voices of the women impacts you. How is hearing the person’s original voice different from just hearing someone else read the words?

-Explore more quotes from these women and other trailblazers at our She Spoke board on Pinterest:

-For a more in-depth project, have students write their own profiles in the style of She Spoke. Start by having them find a quote that exemplifies what their subject stood for. (Please see some great research resources we have compiled.) Once they have selected a quote, they can write a brief profile that shows how that quote exemplifies their subject’s life. This exercise is an excellent way to practice thesis statements and supporting evidence. You could incorporate an artistic element by having students create a portrait of their subject to accompany their writing.

About the Authors:

Kathy MacMillan is a nationally certified American Sign Language interpreter,

writer, teacher, librarian, and storyteller. She is the author of the Little Hands Signing board book series (Familius), the young adult novels Sword and Verse and Dagger and Coin (HarperTeen), and nine books for parents, librarians, and educators, including Little Hands and Big Hands: Children and Adults Signing Together (Huron Street Press). She lives near Baltimore, Maryland, USA. Find her online at KathyMacMillan.com

Manuela Bernardi is a film and TV writer based in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, where she was born and raised. She has collaborated on award-winning feature films and has written on shows for TV Globo, TBS, GNT, Multishow, and the History Channel. Her screenplay for the short film The Healing Tree won USC's Peter Stark Special Project grant and went on to be selected for Cannes’ Short Film Corner. With a BA in journalism from PUC-Rio, Manuela got her MFA in writing for screen and television from USC in Los Angeles, which she attended on a Fulbright/CAPES scholarship.

 

“Thinking with her hands”

by Karen Leggett Abouraya

Maya Lin has built monuments in clay, granite, water, earth, glass and wood. Her most famous monument is the Vietnam Veterans Memorial, an opportunity she won in a contest she entered anonymously as a college student.  It was controversial from the beginning.  Critics wondered why a person of Asian heritage should design a monument to veterans of a war fought against Asians. Others criticized what appeared to them as a black scar in the earth. But now this monument in Washington, D.C., is visited by more than three million people every year.

Vietnam Veterans Memorial/Creative Commons photo

Susan Goldman Rubin’s new and highly acclaimed biography of Maya Lin – Maya Lin: thinking with her hands - includes photos of the many more monuments and sculptures she has designed, along with her struggles about whether and how to design each one. 

                                    

“I try to understand the ‘why’ of a project before it’s a ‘what.’”

She used the Civil Rights Memorial in Montgomery, Alabama, to “give people an understanding of what that time period was about.”  She literally sculpted the earth to create a grassy Wave Field at the University of Michigan’s aerospace engineering building. She redesigned an old barn for a retreat center in Tennessee for the Children’s Defense Fund. 

Not only is Maya Lin: Thinking with her hands a thought-provoking story of how an artist works, it can spur conversations and writing as well.  It could be a perfect way to open a discussion of national and local monuments – including the many that are controversial right now - but you could also have students : 

·       Write about a monument or statue in your town. What does it mean to you? Why is it important for that statue to be in your town?

·       Do you think there are other monuments that could be added or removed from your town? Write a persuasive essay explaining your reasons.

·       If your school is named for a person, what sort of monument would you create to honor that person? This could be a class project, especially for younger children. (My own children’s elementary school in Montgomery County, Maryland, was always known just as “Barnsley.” Turns out it was the first Montgomery County school named for a woman. Lucy V. Barnsley not only taught for 35 years, but also donated books to start the first library in Rockville and started the Retired Teachers Association in the county.)

·       Design a monument to any person or event that is important to you and write an artist’s statement about your monument.  Maya Lin’s essay about her Vietnam Veterans Memorial competition entry is included in the book, but may also be read here.

Maya Lin expects her last commission to be a project called “What is Missing?” at the Cornell Lab of Ornithology in Ithaca, New York. This ecological history of the planet invites scientists, conservationists and everyone to find ways to “learn enough from the past to rethink a different and better future.” And that can spark many many more writing ideas.

 https://childrensbookguild.org/index.php/karen-leggett-abouraya

Young People Making a Difference

by Karen Leggett Abouraya

Children’s Book Guild 2018 Nonfiction Award Winner Phillip Hoose has always been intrigued by young people who make a difference in their world.  They are the subject of most of his books, especially after Sarah Rosen - a teenager in South Bend, Indiana -  asked him, “We’re not taught about young people who have made a difference. Studying history almost makes you feel like you’re not a real person.” Hoose decided he would be the author to find and share the stories of real young people making a difference. 

Hoose brings young leaders to life, including Sarah Rosen in It’s Our World, Too! along with many more in We Were There, Too! Young People in U.S. History. With the meticulous research that characterizes all of his books, Hoose has identified youngsters who sailed with Christopher Columbus right up to those who have been active in the 20^th and 21^st centuries: Olaudah Equiano, who was kidnapped into slavery in Benin, Africa, in 1756; teens Billy Bates and Dick King who escaped from the dreaded Andersonville prison during the Civil War; fourteen-year-old Susie King Taylor, a former slave who had learned to read and shared her skills with countless illiterate children and adults; eight-year-old Margaret Davidson who worked in small ways to counter the anti-German sentiments in her Iowa town during World War II.

Ideas for writing and action pop from every page of Hoose’s books.

·       Write a journal entry for any one of the young people he describes.

o   Imagine being twelve-year-old Diego Bermúdez.  Why did you leave your home? What work did you do on Christopher Columbus’ ship? What was boring? What was exciting? Diego returned to Spain and did not come to the New World again. Why not? His brother Juan did sail across the ocean and the Bermuda Islands were later named for him. These journals also provide an opportunity to discuss the difference between historical fiction – journals that your students would write – and nonfiction, based on primary sources and verifiable facts.

·       What would you like to change in your school or community? How could you begin to make that change? This could be a class discussion and project.

o   Write a plan to lobby or work for the change you desire.

o   Hoose’s book It’s Our World, Too! includes a “A Handbook for Young Activists” with resources and tools for change. The website Youth Activism Project includes many other ideas and examples. The Co-President of the Youth Activism Project, Anika Manzour, helped start School Girls Unite as a middle school student in Kensington, Maryland.

Phillip Hoose says the young people in his books “deserve attention not simply because they are ‘real people’ close to your age. They are important because through their sweat, bravery, luck, talent, imagination and sacrifice – sometimes of their lives – they helped shape our nation.”

Librarians, teachers and students are all invited to hear Phillip Hoose speak at the Children’s Book Guild Nonfiction Award Celebrationon April 7 in Washington, D.C. More details and reservations at www.childrensbookguild.org.  

www.childrensbookguild.org