Her Right Foot Her Right Foot by Dave Eggers is a fascinating, fun nonfiction book about America's most emblematic statue, which is the Statue of Liberty. This book tells the story of how the Statue of Liberty came to be in America, and what it actually stands for. I've never seen the Statue of Liberty in person, but even through pictures I was not able to make out the details of the Statue that Dave and the illustrator Shawn Harris pointed out in the book. Who knew that Lady Liberty's right foot is on the go and that there were broken chains on her? I have NEVER seen the chains until it was illustrated in this book. The themes that I noticed in this book were courage, united, diversity, hope, and immigration. The Statue of Liberty was never meant to be for only "white male Americans". It serves as a reminder to the whole world that America isn't defined as "white only", but to "all the poor, tired, and struggling to breathe free". People came to America for freedom. They came with courage in leaving their lives behind and starting a new one in a new country. They came to America filled with hope that their lives will only be filled with prosperity and not in poverty. America is diverse because we do not have a national language like other countries, and we shouldn't because we need to embrace our uniqueness and unite all those who are different together. We all share one thing in common coming to America, which was hope, so that should unite us together, not divide us. These are some of my thoughts as I read this book and related it to the events occurring to now-a-days dealing with immigration. Through Critical Lens...The image above is a page from Her Right Foot which shows people placing their right hand over their heart as if they were saluting to the American flag like we do in school. This picture is one of the many that really touched me because my interpretation of this was that these were different kinds of people who had more than likely traveled from long distance to come to a new, foreign land. Yet they are saluting to the American flag, or at least showing their respect to the country. So when I think about the events taken place today, it not only breaks my heart, but makes me confused on what we, as Americans, are actually doing to these immigrants. These so-called "foreign" people showed that they came to America not to "take over" it, but to be PART of it. By placing their hand over their heart, they are showing respect to America, but more importantly, they are showing that they are now Americans as well. They came to be united with us, not to divide us. If we can't share the liberty with others, then what is America then? I think it's also important that our students see and understand this part as well that America was built on immigration. Eggers, Dave, and Shawn Harris. Her Right Foot. Chronicle Books, 2017. My Two BlanketMy Two Blanket by Irena Kobald and Freya Blackwood is a story about a girl moving to a new country, which seems to be America, with her Auntie because of war. This story is about how the new world is a strange place for her, and how her blankets were the only thing that comforted her and help change her world. Her name in this book was called Cartwheel, and part of the reason why she is called that is because she enjoyed doing cartwheels in her homeland. The other reason is because she was so free spirited and cheerful until the war broke out. It was then that her Auntie stopped calling her "Cartwheel". This shows her character going from free spirited to quiet and sadness for she could not understand the strange sounds that wrapped her with loneliness. However, that starts to change as the world began to become more familiar to her. The themes that I noticed in this book were courage, hope, friendship, and self-discovering. Cartwheel and her Auntie came to America with hope for a better home for them. They also came with courage for they feared the unfamiliarity in the new world. Even though the theme friendship is not as obvious or elaborate as the other themes, I still think it's an important one because that's how Cartwheel started to become more familiar with her new world. She had help from a friend who took the first step in welcoming her by giving her words to practice saying. With that, those words started to become more familiar to her. This story relates to the world as we know it because there are constantly immigrants who comes to America to escape war and poverty. Everyone knows at least one person who immigrated to America, and maybe have experienced a situation like Cartwheel. Immigrants do feel lonely, different, and left out, so it's up to us to step up like the little girl in the story and help them out even if it's something small. It might make them feel more at home with the help from their neighbors. I also said self-discovering because this book shows how Cartwheel slowly discovered herself and built on her identity as an immigrant in America. From Critical Lens...This image holds a very meaningful event to me from the book. Here Cartwheel is in the process of slowly making her new blanket with words given to her by her new friend. This "new blanket" that she is making is a symbolic meaning of her situation. Her old blanket made her feel warm and soft because it represents her identity before coming to the new world. When she's home, she's back in her comfort zone doing what she's always done and speaking the language that she has always spoken. However, when she steps out to the new world, it was like "standing under a waterfall of strange sounds". It made her uncomfortable and out of place. However, as the little girl slowly gave her words to practice saying over and over again, they began to become more familiar and not so strange anymore. I loved how the authors used the blanket to represent her comfort zone and identity of the new world as she slowly "added new words" to it. Cartwheel is slowly building her identity to belong in her new world. This ties in multiple ways with immigration. This is something that immigrants struggle with as they are forced to come to America and leave their life behind. It's a very hard thing to do. Having to relearn basic skills and knowing simple information can be very hard if you are starting from the bottom and building your way up. So, Cartwheel was fortunate to have a friend who was willingly to help her by offering her little words and phrases at a time to practice, which helped her accommodate to the new world. Kobald, Irena, and Freya Blackwood. My Two Blankets. Little Hare, 2018. WishtreeWishtree by Katherine Applegate is a story about Red, an oak tree, who is the neighborhood's "wishtree". People come and write their wishes on pieces of cloth and tie them to the tree. Red usually stays still and keeps still until a family moves in and a new wish is tied to one of her branches. She then changes her mind with the thought of her last wish in making sure that a little girl's wish comes true. The themes I noticed in this book were courage, hope, friendship, and community. Red had the courage to break the rule of not talking to humans, and to help make at least one of the wishes come true. She wanted to make an impact before she gets chopped down. However, even with that in mind, Red and her friends still had hope that she will survive. Red wasn't the only one filled with hope, but also Samar, the Muslim girl who moved in. Samar wished for a friend because she felt alone and sad. When she made the wish, she had hoped for it to come true deep down. Red also hoped for Samar's wish to come true as well before she is gone. Throughout this story, Red is filled with animals that lived inside her and have relied on her over the many years. They were not just her friend, but they were also her family. Her best friend who moved for her was Bongo, the crow. Bongo stood by her and refused to go any where else when Red was about to be chopped off. That shows the love and friendship that Red had built with Bongo through the many years of relying and being together. The community is also important in this story. The tree represents the community. It is where everyone comes together and unites. It is also where everyone shares one thing in common: desire. They desire because they hope. They all make wishes for something that they hope to get in order to make their life happier, easier, or filled more with love. Whatever the reason may be, they all come together as a community to make wishes. So, in some sense, Red represents the community. Critical Lens...This image was very heart warming and touching to me because it really was a "miracle" that the animals knew the situation and stood up for what they cared about. They cared about Red. Red wasn't just their home, but she was like a mother that protects them. They couldn't even imagine living in a different home other than Red, so I felt like this image was very empowering to the animals. They were all different, yet they wanted to stay together and protect each other. I feel like this was a metaphor to the neighborhood. The message on the tree made everyone feel unsafe and unwanted. It made Samar and her family hard to stay in that neighborhood because they felt unwanted and hated by the people who lived there. However, in the end, Stephan and Samar were able to overcome that and bring the community together to share the differences. They wanted them to STAY, which I believe was the message that was tied to Red on wishing day. It wasn't just meant for the tree to stay, but also to for Samar and her family, who are immigrants, to stay in the neighborhood. It was a very powerful ending to me, and I also think it was a great message to students reading this book. Applegate , Katherine, and Charles Santoso. Wishtree. Feiwel and Friends, 2017. Curricular Connections...All of these three children's literature books had similar themes throughout their story, which were hope, diversity, immigration, and friendship. These books can be used as a way-in to teach students about immigration today, which has become a big topic in our daily talk. I think it would be good to start out with Her Right Foot since most children know about the Statue of Liberty because it represents America. Students can talk about what they know about Lady Liberty and what it means to America. This would be a good introduction activity to immigration. Next, reading My Two Blanket to further talk more about immigration and illustrate how immigration happens or why people immigrate to America. Irena and Freya does a good job at illustrating the identities and feelings of immigrants. The characters in this book can also be relatable to students because they are children that may be similar to the readers' age, which teachers can use that to build connection to the fact that "students will actually have had similar experiences to Cartwheels" (Callow, 2017). Using what students have already experienced or know about immigration, we can then introduce Wishtree to the students because it's not as direct as the other two books about immigration. This is a good way to relate students to the characters in the book and to get an understanding of immigration and immigrants. This text can also be used to dig deeper into what it means to be an immigrant, and how society reacts to it. Students can also further do "quick writes", as suggested by Amy Edwards' article, that allows students to take a step closer to what it means or feels like to be an immigrant. I think it would be interesting to do quick writes after reading each book to see how students' thoughts and ideas about immigration changes from Her Right Foot to Wishtree. I think it would be a meaningful learning experience for students to experience immigration through these texts.
Callow, Jon. “‘Nobody Spoke Like I Did’: Picture Books, Critical Literacy, and Global Contexts.” International Literacy Association, vol. 71, no. 2, 2017, pp. 231–237. Edwards, Amy. “WOW Stories: Connections from the Classroom.” Re-Visioning the World through Multiple Perspectives .
1 Comment
Beth Frye
9/10/2019 11:10:01 am
Thank you for writing such a thorough post!
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