M.L.K.: Journey of a King

Title: M.L.K.: Journey of a King
2008 NCTE Orbis Pictus Winner
Author: Tonya Bolden
Published: 2007
Interesting Facts: (1) "...there comes a time when people get tired of being trampled over by the iron feet of oppression...we are not wrong in what we are doing. If we are wrong, the Supreme Court of this nation is wrong. If we are wrong, the Constitution of the United States is wrong. If we are wrong, God Almighty is wrong" (pg 22). (2) In 1957 during MLK's participation in the Montgomery bus boycott MLK received an anonymous phone call, "Nigger, we are tired of you and your mess...we're going to blow your brains out and blow up your house" (pg 26). Martin prayed, "I am here taking a stand for what I believe is right. But now I am afraid...I am at the end of my powers." Martin listened to his inner voice, " 'Stand up for righteousness, stand up for truth, and God will be at your side forever' " (pg 26). (3) "That night, ML. was at a mass meeting when told that his home had been bombed...he was 'on the verge of corroding hate...' He dug deep for the strength to love...he understood well what the love Jesus preached really meant. He knew that it was neither the love that he felt for...his friends, nor...for Coretta, but rather agape...a higher, harder love: a love that has nothing to do with liking a person, a love worthy of people who do you no good and even do you wrong. Agape says to see past a person's sins to the soul God loves" (pg 28-29). (4) "Nothing could tear M.L. away from the movement. Not defeat in Albany. Not the lure of a guaranteed annual inome of $100,000...Not nonstop death threats. Not a pummeling from a burly neo-Nazi, Roy James, during an address. M.L. made no attempt at self-defense. At one point, he even lowered his hands from his face. 'I'm not interested in pressing charges,' he later said. ' I'm interested in changing the kind of system that produces this kind of man...' " (pg 67) (5) MLK's letter to clergymen who felt that blacks fighting for the promises of democracy were being too impatient, "We have waited for more than 340 years for our constitutional and God-given rights...Perhaps it is easy for those who have never felt the stinging darts of segregation to say, 'Wait...' when you suddenly find your tongue twisted and your speech stammering as you seek to explain to your six-year-old daughter why she can't go to the public amusement park that has just been advertised on television, and see tears welling up in her eyes when she is told that Funtown is closed to colored children, and see ominous cloud of inferiority beginning to form in her little mental sky, and see her beginning to distort her personality by developing an unconscious bitterness toward white people...when you are forever fighting a degenerating sense of 'nobodiness--' then you will understand why we find it difficult to wait" (pg 74).
Curriculum/Pathfinder Suggestion:
US National History Standards, Grades K-4, Standard 4C: Describe how historical figures in the United States and other parts of the world have advanced the rights of individuals and promoted the common good, and identify character traits such as persistence, problem solving, moral responsibility, and respect for others that made them successful.

US National History Standards, Grades 5-12, Postwar United States, Standard 2C: Evaluate how Vietnamese and Americans experienced the war and how the war continued to affect postwar politics and culture.

Now Is Your Time: The African American Struggle for Freedom

Title: Now Is Your Time: The African American Struggle for Freedom
1992 NCTE Orbis Pictus Honor Book
Author: Walter Dean Myers
Published: 1991
Interesting Facts: (1) "Since no one had to hire a black person, whites...could refuse...jobs to young blacks; the law would declare them wards of the state and force them to apprentice for their former masters..." Black Codes "gave former owners of Africans the right to reclaim them as slaves" (pg. 197). (2) "...racism was not about white people liking or not liking black people. It was about controlling the economies of the country by keeping blacks dependent on whites." (3) As a writer for a newspaper called the New York Age, Ida Wells, "...delivered the message that black men and black women were as deserving of justice as whites" (pg. 213). Ida Wells, "did more to curtail the practice of lynching than any other person" (pg. 214). (4) Psychologist Dr. Kenneth B. Clark debunked the notion of separate but equal when he conducted a doll test which provided clear evidence that "African American children did not just feel separated from white children, they felt that the separation was based on their inferiority...Brown vs. Board of Education showed that children who felt inferior also performed poorly" (pg. 256-257). (5) The nature of the fight for democracy changed over time. Nat Turner organized revolts against his enslavers; the 54th fought in the Civil War; Ida B. Wells organized protest by publishing stories in newspapers; Lewis H. Latimer tried earn his way to equality by the works of his inventions; Brown vs. Board of Education ushered in a legal battle for equality (pg. 258).
Curriculum/Pathfinder Suggestion: National US History Standards, Grades 3-4, Standard 8C:
Explain the significance of the printing press, the computer, and electronic developments in communication, and describe their impact on the spread of ideas