Witness by Karen Hesse

Hesse, K. 2001. Witness. Broadway, New York:  Scholastic Inc.

Synopsis:

Act I

There are many characters in this book all from a small Vermont town in 1924. The Ku Klux Klan is moving into town, and people are trying to decide if they want to be a part of it or not in Act I of the book. This first part is getting a feel for the characters, the main ones being Leanora Sutter, Esther Hirsh, Merlin Van Tornhout, and Johnny Reeves. Leanora is an African American 12-year old girl, and Esther is a 6-year old Jewish girl. Neither of them or their families is safe.

Act II

Violence is getting worse. There is a story of a Chicago 14-year old boy that was hit by a car and put in a ditch naked; just because the boy was Jewish. This act in the book discussed more violence since the Ku Klux Klan was coming into town. They burned a cross up on the hill at the Independence Day Celebration. Someone threw a rock with an awful note on it since Sara Chickering houses the young African American Leanora.

Act III

The Ku Klux Klan all say they are all American, only wanting to help the people do right, but they are not. In this act, some drunken KKK members broke into the church, and stole all they had; it wasn’t much, but they did it anyways. The cold blooded kills of the Chicago boy got to live out their life sentences, instead of a hanging; Judge did not like to kill minors, so they both got life. Another character got his car stolen by a KKK member by knifepoint. Another was hung and a liquor bottle stashed in his pocket while his death was named a “suicide.”

Act IV

The local newspaper editor was warned by a letter that he better watch what he writes, or his day will come when he won’t be able to write or publish anything every again. The Klan decided they were going to teach one of the Jewish characters a lesson, so they sent a member to put rat poison in their drinking well to make them really sick, but that person couldn’t, so he ran away. Someone else had to come back and finish the job of trying to kill Esther’s father, so they shot him dead, as well as their dog. The town constable called in help to find Mr. Hirsh’s shooter.

Act V

Esther saw how shot her daddy. The one who was blamed for the shooting, but innocent, jumped off the tallest part of the bridge, and was carried away by the river. Elections were coming up, and President Coolidge won by a landslide. He was the calmest and most collected candidate there ever was.  The new President got rid of all the Klan in the Vermont area. Everything finally all went back to normal in the little town of Vermont.

 This novel was a full of free verse of the many characters in the book. It had an introduction of the characters by name, age, and picture before the story. This book was a very nerve-racking book to me. It contained no capital letters at all. Each page was dedicated to a different character that just kept rotating back around. Each page had that character’s thoughts and actions at the point of view of that character. Each page was in short lined- paragraphs, and in the language and dialect of the characters themselves. The illustration on the front cover is a great look to what the characters from the time of the books setting would look and dress like. It has the “old-timie” single person black and white snapshots of people in their everyday settings. There is no rhyme to this poetry, but it does have paragraphs in similar size for each person’s thoughts and actions.  

Lesson Connection:

CCSS.ELA-Literacy.RL.3.5 Refer to parts of stories, dramas, and poems when writing or speaking about a text, using terms such as chapter, scene, and stanza; describe how each successive part builds on earlier sections

CCSS.ELA-Literacy.RL.3.10 By the end of the year, read and comprehend literature, including stories, dramas, and poetry, independently and proficiently.

Curriculum Activity: Literature Circles and Role playing each of the characters with voices to mimic what they may have sounded like.

Big Question: Compare and contrast the Ku Klux Klan to the Duck Dynasty clan.

MLK Jr.: Boy with a Dream by Dharathula Millender

Millender, D. (1969). Martin Luther King Jr.: Boy with a dream. Indianapolis: The Bobbs-Merrill Company, INC.

                                                                             

This book is a biography of Martin Luther King, Jr. and his life growing up as a young African America after the slavery was banned. He was named after the famous Martin Luther who started the Lutheran Church and the Reformation. His father, Martin Luther King, was a preacher in his own church and started out as a slave, but had grown as a man and learned to stand up for himself as well as to portray that behavior to his son. Early on as a child, M.L (Martin Luther Jr.) he did believe in violence. He thought there was no point in it and it got people nowhere in their disagreement. He thought that you should reason with a person, because you thoughts are more powerful than your fists. He was a very smart kid, and often helped his teachers teach the lower achieving students in his class. He taught other students about topics important to them, and the children loved hearing his stories and facts. It discussed much of who he learned and admired most:  his father Martin Luther King and the preacher one block away, Reverend Borders.

One of the connections I made with this book was one of his teachers, Miss Lemon. She taught exactly the way we all should be teaching: with interactive activities and through texts. She really seemed to love her job and want the best of her students. She wanted all students to feel comfortable in her classroom, and the students didn’t seem to mind being in front of the room and doing a speech for their class over a report that had studied.

There are so many different ways to teach a lesson that involved this book and this topic. Even though it is a biography, it read like an interesting story of events. You could teach about it from a social studies standpoint with cultural inequalities, literature elements standpoint, or just well-rounded literature of a famous person.

 

A Child Called "It" by Dave Pelzer

Pelzer, D. (1995) A Child Called “It.” Omaha:  Omaha Press.

                                         

                This book was very near and dear to my heart. Just last year, I had a child that suffered from child abuse, as did his baby brother that resulted in death. This book really makes me think of the way some children are seen as “problem kids,” when all they need is some love and attention since they are not receiving the right kind at home. This book had many facts about the way some teachers just pass it off as a “bad kid,” but we know all too well that is not the case with too many kids these days.

                This autobiography can be seen in many ways. Some may hate it and they do not face reality. Others can see it for what it is because they know how cruel this world can be. The main character, David Pelzer, was a child abused at such a young age. He was the third of five children in total of his family. He was brainwashed by his mother to say that these bruises were accidents and had stories readily available when someone asked him. His mother tortured him and let him stare most days. Some days, he received a homemade “gas chamber,” other days, a freezing cold tub he had to stay submerged in until told otherwise. The author, the boy in the book, had been known for stealing food from lunch pails, the cafeteria, and the local food mart. This information in this book would be great for all teachers to read to remind them of signs to look for in students that they may see as troubled or bad kids. The setting of this story is set from the 1970s in Daly City, California. The conflict in this story was man person against person. His mother was a true evil person that abused her own child. Why she picked Dave out of all the children, who knows. There were many things about this story to help guide the reader into knowing who David Pelzer really was (characterization). It said a lot about what David thought and helped you visualize with a mental picture of what David looked like by his bruises and old tethered clothing.

This was truly a sad story, but turned into an inspiration to all students that may be going through something similar. They can learn to not let that get them down, but to make something of themselves.

Woods Runner by Gary Paulsen

Paulsen, G. (2009) Woods Runner.  New York:  Wendy Lamb Books.

                                              

      What would you do to get your family back together? Samuel, a thirteen year old boy, likes to be in the forest, where he finds food for his family by hunting. One day, while hunting, he sees smoke coming from the direction of his home. A war had come through his town, and the British had taken Samuel’s parents as prisoners of war, so Samuel and his little sister follow them through the woods off the beaten path. He finds many people along the way that help them get to this family and try to help take them back. Samuel saw so much death or war along the way. But will they get to the family in time?

"He cried over each corpse, thinking of them living, thinking of them

meeting in the cabin and living and talking and laughing and. . .

just being. And now all gone.  Gone.  He could not stop crying,

thinking of his parents, wondering, worrying" (p. 31).

      Once I got into the story, this book is such a page-turner; I couldn’t put it down! The scenes are so life-like, I feel like I can visualize them right in front of me. The descriptiveness of this author’s style is so stimulating to your senses it makes you want to read more and more. You will have to read more of Woods Runner by Gary Paulson to find out more!

Walk Two Moons by Sharon Creech

Creech, S. (1994) Walk two moons. New York:  HarperCollins.


 “Don’t judge a man until you’ve walked two moons in his moccasins” (pg 252). Sal is a 13 year old Indian girl that is a country girl at heart who dearly misses her mother, who went away for a while. On the trip out to see her mother, some unforeseen events happen that get your attention and make you want to read on! Sal tells the stories of her life on this trip to her grandparents, and some are unmistakably funny, others tear-jerking. This book has its good times, and not so good times, but it gives you an exciting ride to follow along with as you read. The little messages she gets on the porch change the mood of the story as the crazy lunatic is thought to have left them. But read Walk Two Moons by Sharon Creech to find out what is really going on in their moccasins, and who will not return to Bybanks, Kentucky…

Lowry, Lois. 1993. The Giver. [Kindle Fire] Retrieved from http://www.amazon.com

      

The Giver by Lois Lowry

The Giver is a fantasy story of a twelve-year old boy named Jonas that lives in the world of Sameness. He lives with his mother, father, and younger sister in a house similar to every other house and just like every other family in their little world. When people break the rule, or do not meet the standards of the town, they are “released,” or killed. The town has many rules to live by, and no changes in weather or schedule. Each person in the world of Sameness is chosen to work different jobs at the age of twelve at the Ceremony of Twelves.   One of the jobs, the Receiver of Memory, is a job that holds all memories, good and bad, so the town does not have to endure them. Then Jonas starts training for his new job at the age of twelve, with a man named the Giver, he is given many memories, and soon realizes that the world he has grown up in has many imperfections. He has to do something very courageous to save his town, but he can never back.

The style of this book is very simplistic. The sentences flow and are an easy read. The setting is in a small district that is called Sameness, and seems to be in a future setting due to some of the advancements in technology. The point of view is third person-sympathetic, meaning it gives the story from an outsider’s perspective, but also gives the thoughts of Jonas, the main character. The major conflict is man vs. nature, but also has a little bit of man vs. man involved as well.

This book can be used in many different contents, and in many different ways. In social studies, it can be compared to the rules of society, and capitol punishment. In history, it can teach the importance of memories and history. Government is also a good subject to read this book. Once a person is chosen to do a certain job, they have the chance to appeal if they are unhappy.  It can also teach the freedom of choice, since in the book, at the age of twelve, their destinies are chosen for them. The big question could involve memories:  What is the importance of keeping the memories? Or what could happen to our world if we had no memory of the past?

Lucy and the Bully Reflection

Book Reflection

Picture Book Reflection

Lucy and the Bully by Claire Alexander

 

This book is a cute story of a little lamb that loves school, especially art class. All the other students agree that Lucy is a great artist, and wish they could draw like her.  She is also being bullied and is too afraid to tell an adult. This is a scenario that many young kids can relate to.  Lucy gets so upset, that she finally breaks down and tells her mother, who immediately calls the school. Lucy is scared and can’t sleep, but school turns out to be a good change. The bully, Tommy the bull, and his mother are there and he apologizes for his actions. In turn, she feels like it is a true apology, and claims that he did it because he may be mad that he doesn’t have the talent she has in art class. Lucy forgives Tommy, and they start a friendship. This is a great lesson for all students, since there are so many bullies that get caught, but it doesn’t make them bad people. People just make mistakes and we have to learn from them.

Even though this story is fiction, many students can relate to it. The characters, a lamb and a bull, seem like they should get along, and they don’t at first, but end up building a friendship in the end. The setting is mostly at school in the art classroom. This is where the bullying starts. Then Lucy goes home, then back to school.  The theme of this story was about the concept of bullying. It teaches students a lesson on how bullying is bad, but you can change your ways, and not be a bully. You will make more friends if you do not bully.  Also, I liked the detail added in art class on Lucy’s friends commenting on her talented art skills.  This shows compassion for others talents, and is a great reminder to kids to look at the positives.

 

Resource:

Alexander, C. (2008). Lucy and the bully: a concept book. Morton Grove: Albert Whitman & Company.