Below is an annotated list of children's literature for the elementary classroom. The books are organized by the Six Elements of Social Justice Curriculum Design (Picower, 2007). It is based on work by pre-service teachers at Montclair State University. They have read and reviewed these books and provided insights into how they can be used in K-5 settings.

Tuesday, November 10, 2015

The Split History of the Civil Rights Movement


The Split History of the Civil Rights Movement

Author: Nadia Higgins
Content Consultant: Zoe Burkholder, PhD
Grade Level: 4-5

To buy this book and add to your class library, click here!
To learn more about the author, click here!

Summary
This book is about the history of the Civil Rights Movement. The book gives both the activists' perspective as well as the segregationists' perspective. The book gives an overview of both politics and events that occurred during this time. There are accounts of very famous activists like Martian Luther King Jr as well as everyday people that participated in the movement to gain civil rights.

Element 4- Social Movement and Social Change
This book relates to element 4 in that it is a prime example of a social movement. The Civil Rights Movement is probably one of the most studied social movements in school. The Split History of the Civil Rights Movement is an ideal book to use in teaching this social movement because it shows a timeline of events that took place to create a social change. It also shows perspectives of well known activists as well as everyday people that fought for change. This book addresses very well known events such as the Brown vs. Board of Education case, Rosa Parks refusing to move her seat, and Martian Luther King's "I Have a Dream" speech. The book also talks about the nine courageous black teenage students that integrated into a school in Little Rock, black college students staging a sit-in at an all white lunch counter, and the Freedom Riders. These three accounts are of everyday people making a change and standing up for a cause. These people were all a part of a movement and have united to create change.

Classroom Activity 
Split the class into groups of 4 or 5. Assign each group an activist or an event to study from the book. Each group will have to conduct research using the book as well as other materials provided by the teacher. They will then be asked to create a poster board about the event and the activist(s) that were involved and present to the class. 



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