Brave Eagle's Account of The Fetterman Fight

Goble, P. & D. (1972). Brave Eagle’s account of the Fetterman Fight: 21 December 1866. USA: Pantheon.

            “The white men have surrounded me and have left me nothing but an island.  When we first had this land we were strong, now our nation is melting away like snow on the hillsides where the sun is warm; while the white people grow like the blades of grass when summer is coming.  I do not want the white people to make any roads through our country.”  (Red Cloud)

            In 1866, the American nation was in a period of reconstruction following the Civil War.  Most of the native Indian tribes had already been driven from their lands onto reservations.  Only a few still held portions of their homelands.  The government wanted a right of way through the Sioux and Cheyenne territories in Wyoming and Montana, leading to the gold mines in Virginia City.  This route, the Bozeman Trail, had been used by white civilians for several years, but with great risk of attacks.  Weary with war, Washington officials decided it would be cheaper to appease the Indians than fight them.  A meeting was arranged between government officials and the tribes at Fort Laramie “to make peace.”  There were wagon loads of gifts for the Indians, which they never accepted after realizing that they had once again been deceived.  Whether negotiations were successful or not, the decision had already been made to use the trail and provide military protection to civilians.  The government did not want peace, it wanted the land—the best ancestral hunting grounds—and it wanted the gold.  The tribes angrily left the gathering, having no interest whatsoever in giving up more of their lands.  Forts were built along the trail and soldiers were stationed there, but at no time was travel safe, sometimes it was impossible.  Knowing they had no choice, the united tribes effectively fought against the soldiers for 6 months prior to the battle with Captain Fetterman and his 82 men, who all were killed.  This book records a first-person account of the events before, during, and after the Fetterman Fight, which was the Army’s worst defeat in the battles for the Bozeman Trail.  The fighting continued until at last the government ordered the forts to be abandoned.  The Bozeman Trail was closed by the Treaty of 1868, and the country was given back to the Indians.  The land was promised to Red Cloud’s people forever.  Red Cloud vowed to fight no more.  Although this treaty was soon forgotten, and soldiers continued to come, Red Cloud, true to his word, never fought them again.

Red Cloud

           “Red Cloud’s War is the only instance in the history of the United States where the government has gone to war and afterwards negotiated a peace conceding everything demanded by the enemy and exacting nothing in return.” (Doane Robinson)

            Republished a decade after the original, this non-fiction book was written for young adults.  Many of its pages are illustrated by colorful paintings depicting scenes described in the text.  The descriptive, chronological, first-person narrative includes explicit accounts of battle scenes and individuals involved.  Leaders like Red Cloud, Crazy Horse, American Horse, and Sitting Bull are part of the story that begins with events leading up to the Fetterman Fight, and continues beyond.  Told from Brave Eagle’s point of view, there are many insights into his culture, philosophies and ways of life.  There are often-contrasting insights into white man culture as well. Red Cloud's first-person accounts were extracted from his recorded speeches.

Question:  How might the fighting have been prevented?

Question:  What would be your reaction if you owned land that you depended on for your livelihood, and someone came to build a road through the best part?

Question:  Is the government always right?

            

Here's Looking at Me: How Artists See Themselves

Raczks, B. (2006). Here’s looking at me: How artists see themselves. Minneapolis, Minnesota: Millbrook Press.

             “If you were going to paint a picture of yourself, how would you do it?  Would you look in the mirror?  Or would you paint yourself from memory?  Would you get all dressed up?  Would you wear your pajamas?  Or would you dress up like somebody else?  Would you paint yourself smiling, or looking very serious?  Would you paint your entire body, or just your head?  These are just some of the questions the artists in this book considered….
Every artist has his or her own way of making a self-portrait….” (p. 3)

              There is much to be learned from studying artists’ self-portraits, including styles of a particular time and place, and artists’ introspection.  This attractive informational book, themed around the self-portrait, is written for ages 8-11 and up.  It is structured to devote one page of conversational style text accompanying each full-page captioned self-portrait by fourteen artists.  The author has chosen artists important to art history from early Renaissance to modern times, including three women.  Several intriguing observations are briefly examined, such as Chagall’s having painted himself with seven fingers, Goya affixing candles to his hat so he could work at night, and why Rockwell’s triple self-portrait contains more than three.  With text printed on faux parchment, this book is a beautifully presented introduction to art history for young and older, whetting appetites for more.  

   

Artemisia Gentileschi (1593-1652)

Self-Portrait as Pittura

                    What does this self-portrait of Artemisia Gentileschi have in common with
                    the Statue of Liberty? If you said that both are women, you’re on the
                    right track. The answer is, both are allegories.

                    
                    An allegory is a symbol, often a person, that stands for something else.
                    For example, the Statue of Liberty is the woman who stands for freedom. In
                    this self-portrait, Artemisia Gentileschi painted herself as Pittura, the woman
                    who stands for the art of painting.

                    According to mythology, Pittura invented painting. And around her neck,
                    on a gold chain, she wore the “mask of imitation”—just as Artemisia is
                    wearing it in this painting. So why did she paint herself as Pittura?

                    Artemisia lived in Italy at a time when women were discouraged from
                    becoming painters. They were expected to stay at home and raise families.
                    But Artemisia’s father was a painter, and he taught her everything he knew.
                    In fact, Artemisia learned to paint before she learned to read. By painting
                    herself as Pittura, Artemisia was telling the people who didn’t think she
                    should be a painter, “No one can keep me from painting. Painting is what
                    I do. Painting is who I am.” (p. 8)

Question: How would (will) you paint your self-portrait, and why?

Reading Log and Wiki Checklist

Reading Log for 30 books

Genre / Titles read

             I.      Non-fiction/Informational (1 reflection* required on blog)

       1)  *Brave Eagle’s Account of The Fetterman Fight by Paul and Dorothy Goble
       2) *Here's Looking at Me: How Artists See Themselves by B. Raczks.

          II.      Poetry (1 reflection* required on blog)

1)      Who Killed Mr. Chippendale? By Mel Glenn. (required for discussion)

2)      *You Read to Me, I’ll Read to You by Mary Ann Hoberman and Michael Emberley

3)      Silly Street by Jeff Foxworthy

4)      Green Eggs and Ham by Dr. Seuss

5)      My Very Own Name by Maia Haag

       III.      Modern Fantasy (1 reflection* required on blog)      

1)      A Wrinkle in Time by Madeleine L’Engle. (required for discussion)

2)      *Starfields by C. Marsden

3)      The Tale of Peter Rabbit by Beatrix Potter

4)      The Hobbit by J.R.R. Tolkein

       IV.      Historical Fiction (1 reflection* required on blog –can be a picture book)   

1)      Moon Over Manifest by Clare Vanderpool. (required for discussion)

2)      *Titanic; Book One: Unsinkable by Gordon Korman

3)      Titanic; Book Two: Collision Course by Gordon Korman

4)      Titanic; Book Three: S.O.S. by Gordon Korman

          V.      Multicultural/Traditional (2 reflections* required on blog – one can be a picture book)       

                  1)  Dancing with the Indians by Angela Shelf Medearis

                  2)  *Two Brothers by Eugene Schwarz

                  3)  *Starfields by C. Marsden (double entry)

                  4)  Star Boy by Paul Goble

                  5)  Children of the Earth and Sky by Stephen Krensky

                  6)  Cherokee Animal Tales by George F. Scheer

                  7)  The Girl Who Loved Wild Horses by Paul Goble

                  8)  Jack and the Beanstalk by E. Nesbit

                  9)  Treasury of Aesop’s Fables Foreword by Oliver Goldsmith

       VI.      Realistic Fiction (1 reflection* required on blog)

1)      Bucking the Sarge by Christopher Paul Curtis. (required for discussion)

2)      *The Invention of Hugo Cabret by Brian Selznick

3)      *Black Beauty by Anna Sewell

4)      Julie of the Wolves by Jean Craighead George

    VII.      Picture Books (6 reflections* required on blog)

1)      Seven Blind Mice by Ed Young. (required for discussion)

2)      *Good Night, Gorilla by Peggy Rathmann

3)      *Tuesday, by D. Wiesner

4)      *Curious George Goes Camping by Margaret & H. A. Rey’s

5)      Curious George Goes to the Beach by Margaret & H. A. Rey’s

6)      Curious George at the Aquarium by Margaret & H. A. Rey’s

7)      Vincent’s Colors words & pictures by Vincent van Gogh

8)      The Hello, Goodbye Window by Norton Juster

9)      Andrew Henry’s Meadow by Doris Burn

10)   Where the Wild Things Are by Maurice Sendak

11)   The Grouchy Ladybug by Eric Carle

12)   *The Invention of Hugo Cabret by Brian Selznick (double entry)

13)   *You Read to Me, I’ll Read to You by Mary Ann Hoberman and Michael Emberley (double entry)

14)   *Brave Eagle’s Account of The Fetterman Fight by Paul and Dorothy Goble (double entry)

Wiki Checklist

1__ Social Studies – Star Boy

2__ Science – The Invention of Hugo Cabret, and Titanic; Book One: Unsinkable

1__ Math – A Wrinkle in Time

  __ Music

1__ Art – The Invention of Hugo Cabret

  __ Reading/Language Arts

1__ Physical Education – Dancing with the Indians

1__ Other (Health & Social Awareness) – A Wrinkle in Time

Field Hours Summary

1. How many hours did you complete?

            I completed 6 hours.

2. How did you spend your time?

            I ordinarily visit Toddler Story Time for one hour each week with my granddaughter
at the Whitley County Public Library. I am claiming 4 of these visits as field experience.
For the first 3 visits, I was an observer/participant, as usual. During the fourth visit, I read
aloud two picture books to the children; then distributed kits for the craft project. Two
additional hours were spent at the W.C. Library. For one hour, I cut out paper hands,
hearts, and other shapes that were to be used in an activity with a group of young children.
The second hour was spent wrapping the jackets of new books, which I had not done 
before.

           
3. How did the experience help you to strengthen at least one Kentucky Teacher Standard?

Standard 10: The teacher provides leadership within the profession, school, and community.

            The nature of my field experience activities should probably be categorized more as service than leadership.  However, while cutting many paper shapes, sitting by a window where I could see the top of the Judicial building that houses stained glass windows representing a year of my life’s work, I thought how different this cutting activity is from the (glass and metal) cutting I was doing a year ago, but similarly it would quietly touch some people’s lives.  I reflected on different events from my 38 years of living and participating in the Williamsburg community, events involving the library, the schools, the college, churches, the Art Guild, adult literacy, Scouts, 4-H sewing & shooting sports, etc.  These endeavors have included a variety of leadership roles.  My life and work continue to be somewhat invisibly interwoven with the fabric of the local culture.  Like the children who would glue the papers I was cutting, and the fathers who would receive the cards from those children, most of the people I saw coming and going in the library that day knew nothing of me, what I had done, or what I am doing.  I was just an old woman sitting there in the cool, quiet library, making too much noise cutting with dull scissors, reflecting on the many faces of service.  Punctuating my varied roles, a young, tall, handsome African college student that I had not seen for maybe 2 years, happened in and greeted me with a broad smile and some chit-chat.  How gratifying to realize that my work, my “leadership” roles also invisibly impact the broader community.

4. Talk a little about one thing you learned because of this field experience.

            I think it is interesting that my little one, who adores books and stories in other settings, rarely pays attention to the Story Time book reading.  Play time seems to be the highlight for her and many of the children—it is more a socializing time than book time.  She has on occasion taken a book from the shelves, sat down and looked through it.  I think the reading aspect might be more effective for some children if structured specifically as reading time, separate from play time, although the play time is excellent for what it is.  It is interesting to observe the different interactions among the children.  It seems that their having fun in the library environment establishes that setting in their consciousness as a positive and friendly place.  I have learned that maybe that is the goal.  My little one recognizes the building, knows what it is, and looks forward to going there.

Titanic - Booktalk

Korman, G. (2011). Titanic; Book one: Unsinkable. USA: Scholastic.

            Have you heard about a great ship called Titanic?  A hundred years ago, in the spring of 1912, the Titanic was the largest and most majestic ocean liner on the open seas.  It was the best of the best.  It was called ‘the ship of dreams’.  It was also called ‘unsinkable’.  On its first voyage, all kinds of people were aboard--over 2200--including the richest of the rich, the poorest of the poor, the friendly, and the fearsome.  Imagine what it would have been like to be a passenger, steaming to New York on the magnificent Titanic.

            Now, imagine what it was like to be a fourteen-year-old street orphan in Ireland, who had gotten himself and his best friend, Daniel, into some serious trouble with a ruthless gangster.  While running for their lives, Paddy Burns was forced to leave Daniel behind and become a stowaway on board the Titanic, where he soon found all the secret passageways and good places to hide. 

            Have you ever been embarrassed by your parents?  Paddy’s new friends, Sophie and Juliana had been.  American Sophie’s activist mother was arrested in many different places while making speeches for women to have the right to vote.  Julie’s father, of the English nobility class, was much too fond of strong drink and gambling.  Junior ship's steward, Alphie’s father shoveled coal into the blazing furnaces that powered the Titanic.   

   

            As Paddy looked out at the endless, cold, black, Atlantic Ocean, he was thinking….only 10 days ago he had been living on the streets of Belfast, picking pockets to survive.  The great Titanic had been nothing more than an immense form under construction, with four towering smokestacks that cast shadows over him, Daniel, and half the city.  ...Daniel, the best friend a lad could ever have.  Was he dead because of my mistake?  All I have left of him is his beautiful drawing of the great ship, showing a mysterious, long gash along its side...  But the world continued to turn, and the ship continued to sail.  I had to live here and now, not in the past.  If surviving made little sense, the alternative made that much less.  So, to the matter at hand.  He needed somewhere to go—a place where the officers would not find him….

            I think you would find sailing on the Titanic with Paddy Burns especially exciting--exploring every inch of the great ship, getting to know the other passengers, and trying to stay alive.  Find out in three fast-moving historical fiction books by Gordon Korman: Titanic 1; Unsinkable, Titanic 2; Collision Course, and Titanic 3; S.O.S. 

  

Black Beauty

Sewell, A. (1983). Black Beauty. London WI: Cathay Books Limited.

            An autobiographical novel told from the first-person point of view of a horse, Black Beauty was the first of its kind when it was published in 1877, and remains popular throughout the world today.  Black Beauty is a realistic fiction chapter book for young adults.  It surely should be read particularly by any child who has love of or contact with horses.  There is a measure of sadness and cruelty in the story, although not extremely portrayed, and balanced by good.  The author’s purpose was to draw attention to and halt the mistreatment of horses in her time.  Beginning in his happy and free days as a foal on an idyllic farm with his mother, Black Beauty narrates his life experiences alongside other horses and different masters, both kind and cruel, until he is old and once again in a happy situation.  The events could indeed have happened to people and animals in the past as well as in modern settings.  Situational realism is provided by characters of identifiable ages and social classes.  Emotional realism is provided through personification--believable feelings and relationships experienced by Black Beauty, Ginger, and other horse companions.  Insights into social realism are glimpsed through honest portrayals of the different humans whose lives are intertwined with those of the horses, although the horses are explored more pointedly than the humans.  Consequently the book was censored and/or banned by some in its own time because it was considered immoral to attach human traits to animals.

            Initially I found the reading to be slightly bumpy because some of the words and sentence structures are unlike what we are accustomed to reading from modern authors.  It required re-reading some lines, then slowing down for a few pages before adjusting to the graceful flow of the author’s well-crafted narrative.  The 49 chapters are each 3-5 pages in length, helping to move the story along at an interesting pace while providing the necessary scene changes for different times, places, characters and episodes.  The chapters could almost be short stories in themselves.      

  

            Set in England in the nineteenth century, some of the terms and ways of life may seem foreign to readers in the twenty-first century, yet the story is still engaging and its gentle moral and ethical teachings remain relevant for young people of any period.  Children can easily make horse-human and human-human connections, such as receiving and giving respect, kindness, and sympathy.  Although the author’s Quaker roots are evident, the underlying notion of ethical treatment of animals transcends any particular religious doctrine.  The novel was influential in the beginnings of the ongoing movement for animal welfare.  Cruelty is cowardly and the devil’s own trade mark (p. 44).  “….there is no religion without love, and people may talk as much as they like about their religion, but if it does not teach them to be good and kind to man and beast, it is all a sham….” (p. 45).  Black Beauty’s first master thought that God gave animals knowledge that does not depend on reasoning--more prompt and perfect in its way—so that animals understand things humans do not sense before reasoning, or after tragedy. 

            Black Beauty is the embodiment of horse sense, which is also demonstrated in the best of his human companions.  Observed from the horses’ perspectives, there are many insights into the nature of humans--how some are kind, thoughtful and wise; others cruel, foolish, vain, ignorant and careless.  Compassion is named as the defining trait of a true gentleman or woman.  Wrongdoing through ignorance and carelessness is explored particularly in the character of Joe, who as a boy causes unintended great harm to Black Beauty, later reappearing as an older and wiser, excellent caretaker in the climax of the story.  Drunkenness is an evil theme visited more than once with sad or tragic results.  However, Jerry, one of Black Beauty’s kind owners, is revealed to have overcome his destructive craving for alcohol through mutual family love and devotion.  He is a kind man who demonstrates the Golden Rule in his treatment of horses and humans.  Some of the humans are foolishly concerned with fashion at the expense of the horses and others in their service.  The novel influenced the abolition of the bearing rein, which was fashionable but torturous for the horses, and blinkers (blinders) that obstructed the horse’s vision.  Even the dreadful perplexity of war is addressed from the perspective of The Old War Horse.  When asked what the humans fought about, he replied, “….that is more than a horse can understand, but the enemy must have been awfully wicked people, if it was right to go all the way over the sea on purpose to kill them” (p. 109).

            As with humans, the quality of the early lives of the horses shape their adult lives. “Good places make good horses” (p. 31).  Black Beauty’s fine character was molded in a compassionate environment.  Some of the other horses had not been so fortunate.  A human parallel is found in the reference to a little boy who was so traumatized by his older brother’s dressing as a ghost and chasing him that he became an idiot (p. 62).  The necessary ingredients for a happy and healthy horse are the same as for humans: patience, gentleness, firmness, petting, and common sense every day.  In later life, during one terrible night after his having been mistreated, Black Beauty reflected on his time as a foal, beside his mother in a peaceful summer meadow.  As part of his mother’s advice, she told him to always do his best wherever it is, and to keep up his good name—sound advice for any youngster, and admirable aspirations for character education.  Two other thought-provoking quotes concerning moral and social education are: “If a thing is right, it can be done, and if it is wrong, it can be done without; and a good man will find a way….” (p. 118); and, a portrayal of good citizenship in a free society, “…. if we see cruelty and wrong that we have the power to stop, and do nothing, we make ourselves sharers in the guilt” (p. 124).     

Question to explore following the reading of Black Beauty: 

How has the treatment of horses changed since 1877?

Why are bearing reins bad for horses?

What things make a horse happy?

Are you kind to animals?

Are you kind to other people?

Why is kindness important?

           

             

             

You Read to Me, I'll Read to You

Hoberman, M. A., Emberley, M. (2005). You read to me, I’ll read to you; Very short Mother Goose Tales to read together. New York: Little, Brown and Company-Time Warner book Group.

            This children’s picture poetry book is the third in a series of three read-aloud volumes that readers of any age may enjoy.  Written in short verses that are color coded and arranged so that it is easy to distinguish parts for the different readers, each poem is complete on a single or double-spread page.  There is no need to turn pages once a particular reading has begun.  This volume uses common nursery rhymes as the point of departure for verses with a playful twist.  The author recommends that the original versions of the rhymes be read first to contrast with the new versions.  As Humpty Dumpty tries to persuade a doctor to fix his broken shell, Baa Baa Black Sheep sheds his wool, Little Miss Muffet befriends the spider beside her, and Old Mother Hubbard’s dog phones the butcher, the author’s use of alliteration, rhyme, and repetition serve to make the stories interesting and fun for reading aloud.  Choral reading is encouraged.  The silly illustrations are paintings of cartoon-like characters that mirror the text content.

   

We read each page

To one another.

You’ll read one side,

I the other.

            After reading the rhymes together, students may be encouraged to write and illustrate their own imaginative versions of these and other common rhymes.  They could act out the parts.

            Question:  What if...?

Starfields

Marsden, C. (2011). Starfields. Crawfordsville, IN: Candlewick Press.

            Starfields is a multicultural modern fantasy chapter book for young adults.  Told from the third-person-sympathetic point of view, its integral setting is rural Chiapas, Mexico, where the main character, a nine year old Mayan girl, Rosalba, lives with her family in a small village.  The progressive plot is structured with chapters alternating between the story of Rosalba and Xunko, a young Mayan shaman living in a much earlier time.  Xunko’s mythical dream diary parallels, then merges through time-warp with Rosalba’s contemporary story.  Having a long fascination for the Mayan culture, the author themed the story around the Mayan prophecy concerning the perceived December 21, 2012 “end of the world.”  She tells the story in an easy to read, smoothly flowing style.  The chapters are brief, weaving the tale gracefully as Rosalba weaves her traditional narrative blouses—the same as her grandmothers.  Many terms and concepts are in Rosalba’s language, with a useful glossary provided at the end of the book.  Rosalba and her unique environment are well described so that the reader may experience distinct mental impressions of sights, smells, sounds, touch, and tastes.  It is more than a glimpse into Rosalba’s world-- a very different world from the one known by many young English language readers-- rich in tradition for readers of her own heritage.  Rosalba’s conflicts with self, others, and society; the underlying themes of the power of friendship, morality, courage; and quiet reverence for Spirit and the Earth (or lack thereof), are universal.

            Rosalba is portrayed as a thoughtful, dutiful girl.  She exhibits a respectful affinity with the natural and spiritual world.  In her remote village she and her people carry on the traditions of the ancestors in their daily toils and celebrations.  Their lives are fruitful and fulfilling.  Rosalba’s life changes after meeting Alicia, a wealthy white girl from Mexico City, who came as part of her scientist father’s expedition to study the mass dying-off of native frogs (simile to canaries in the mines).  The girls instantly become friends in spite of their many differences.  Foreshadowing their common protest against a road being built into Rosalba’s village, on their first meeting together they built a “frog palace” of sticks beside the river.  Both girls gain greater insight into each others’ ways of life as they become allied in the battle to save the frogs, along with all they represent.  When Rosalba discovers men with a bulldozer slashing the forest and cutting a road from the highway toward her village (and perhaps even beyond to the sacred mountain that houses the benevolent spirit of god), she is horrified.  Foreseeing the changes that the road would bring to their way of life, including destruction of the natural environment, she desperately seeks a way to halt it. 

            Xunko was groomed as a shaman from the time he was in his mother’s womb.  During his first several years his eyes were wrapped in bandages so that he may not see the outer world.  Instead, he was taught to see the inner spiritual world.  He became a visionary prophet, foreseeing, among other visions, Rosalba and the magnitude of the impact of her actions on the lives of the people in a distant future.  Deeply disturbed by these visions, Xunko appears to Rosalba in a series of dreams, guiding her in the path she should take against malevolence, never doubting her power.  As shamans may do, he further transforms and travels through time, appearing in Rosalba’s world as an atypical crow that plucks the colorful yarn from her weaving, thus instructing her to weave instead the intensely controversial, non-traditional dream-representation of dead cornfields in blacks and browns.  Rosalba fears that to do so would ostracize her not only from the people, but from god as well.  Because her dream visions are so compelling, her sense of anxiety for the health of her environment so intense, and with no other solution in sight, she faces her fears and weaves the forbidden narrative, bravely leading the way to resolution and prolongation of a good life—at least for now.

            The author leaves the reader with a sense of hope.  Because the majority of the ancient Mayan codices have been lost or destroyed, the modern world is left without access to their whole insight.  “On December 21, 2012, our solar system is again due to pass through the heart of the Milky Way.  On this date, the Mayan calendar mysteriously ends….Today, recent books like Apocalypse 2012, by Lawrence E. Joseph, have made an explicit connection between the Mayan prophecy and environmental destruction…. Mayan scholars agree that the prophesy merely speaks to the closing of a natural cycle.  According to the Mayan calendar, the Solar System has visited the center of the Milky Way four times previously and has survived.  Why would this time be any different?  The story of Starfields explores a little of both perspectives, trying to imagine how two young girls from very different backgrounds might interpret the prophesy in relation to their own lives….” (Author’s Note, p. 207-8).    

            This story has many underlying themes that may be explored, such as courage and conviction, loyalty, friendship, paying attention, and overcoming obstacles.  The greatest theme (posing the biggest questions) seems to be recognizing what is truly of value, and striving to preserve what is left of our natural sustainable environment from “progress.”  Unborn generations will not benefit from inheriting a ruined planet.  Rosalba demonstrates that individuals can have a positive impact, small to massive, through their thoughts and actions.  A text-to-self connection reflects upon my participation in a concerted but unsuccessful effort to prevent mining near my ancestral lands.  Everything right was on “our side,” including but not limited to scientific documentation that there was not enough coal present to be mined profitably, the presence of rare and fragile flora and fauna, and family histories of resource stewardship dating from the American Revolution and earlier Native generations.  Unlike Rosalba, Alicia, and Xunco’s outcome, our outcome lies there still, two years later: hideous open wounds in the earth apparently having legal pardon from “reclamation” due to unprofitability.  No jobs were created.  The local economy did not benefit.  Neighbors were placed at odds with one another.  The land is ruined.  The water table is affected.  Once-natural habitats are destroyed forever.  The last “unspoiled” tributary in the Kentucky River system is in peril if not already changed. 

            All teachers, regardless to whether or not there is sentimental or economic loyalty toward coal miners, or loggers, or bankers, or railroads, or factory farms, or industry, or whatever the local and global cultures espouse, should lead students at every level to seek the deeper truths, to observe, to question, and to entertain alternative, better ways of thinking, doing, and being.

            Questions:  What is the Zapatista uprising?  How are hot dogs made?  What do bees do?  What is the path of the water you drink?  Are electric cars better for the environment?  Do all fish of the same species have identical faces?  What is the age of California redwood trees and why do they still live?  Which forest plants have medicinal qualities?  How many years does it take for tuna to mature?  ...on and on.

AWARDS:
Bank Street College of Education Best Books of 2012

REVIEWS:
School Library Journal: "...Rosalba’s story of self-realization is a strong one, and the juxtaposition of traditional and new ideas delivers considerable food for thought. A burgeoning environmental crisis is timely, as well."

Booklist: "...the story is so dripping with myth and mystery that kids will be intrigued, and as always, Marsden’s writing is beautiful and her knowledge about children’s hearts is immense."

http://www.carolynmarsden.com/starfields__candlewick_2011__93222.htm

                

Two Brothers

Schwarz, E., (1896-1958). Two brothers. English language translation: Hapgood, E. R. (1973). New York: Harper & Row.

            Retold in English from the original Russian, Two Brothers is an example of translated international literature that was included in the Weekly Reader Children's Book Club.  This children’s picture book is written in the third-person-omniscient point of view.  It is illustrated with realistic black and white etchings that authentically preserve cultural details in the characters’ appearance, clothing, homes, means of transportation, and items appropriate to the time and place of its unique setting.  The illustrations serve to enrich the meaning and mood of the story, especially since detailed descriptions of the same imagery are not always part of the text.  Two Brothers may be categorized as modern fantasy.  It is set in rural Russia at the home of a forester and his family, moves beyond the realistic into an imagined place with unusual characters and very strange situations, then back again, emphasizing the power of the universal values of kindness, friendship, and love.

            “….Now, once upon a time a forester lived in a great forest and his name was Blackbeard….” (p. 7).  Blackbeard walked every day back and forth through his forest where he knew every tree by name.  While in the forest he was happy.  At home he was troubled by his two sons, Big Brother, 12, and Little Brother, 7, because they quarreled every day.  In the middle of winter the parents had to go away for three days, leaving the brothers alone.  Big Brother promised not to mistreat Little Brother.  One evening Little Brother wanted Big Brother to play with him, but Big Brother wanted to finish reading his book.  He yelled, “Leave me alone!” and pushed Little Brother outside, closing the door—only for a little while.  Too much time elapsed before Big Brother remembered.  He opened the door to cold pitch darkness and no Little Brother.  Just then the parents returned.  Blackbeard sent Big Brother to find Little Brother, not to return without him.  He wandered remorsefully beyond his known land into a strange frozen place where he encountered the fearsome and unkind Great Grandfather Frost, who had imprisoned Little Brother.  In order to find his dear little brother, Big Brother went with the frightening old man into his terrible frozen world, where he was forced to daily freeze small forest creatures over icy black flames.  He began hiding animals and birds in his sleeve to save them.  The grateful animals repaid his kindness by helping to eventually free both the brothers.  Big Brother was so happy to have his little brother back that he never again was mean to him.  They lived together in true friendship.

            Tweet: Kindness melts the ice. 

            The theme of kindness is one most worthy of children’s attention.  Children should be taught that unkind words and deeds can have strong, sometimes unintended effects--usually not good ones--while kindness is uplifting for both its giver and receiver.

 

            Questions: Can you recall a time when someone was unkind to you?  How did it make you feel?  Can you recall a time when someone was kind to you?  How did it make you feel?  How could Big Brother have responded differently to Little Brother when he wanted to play?  What do you think Big Brother was thinking while he was wandering through the cold forests searching for his little brother?  How did the family feel when everyone was reunited?