Title: Rosa
Written by Nikki Giovanni
Illustrator: Bryan Collier
Publisher: First Scholastic, 2005
Genre: Picture Book, Biography K-5
Awards: Caldecott Honor Book and Coretta Scott King Award
Summary: Rosa worked in the alternative department in Alabama in the year 1955. She is known as the greatest seamstress in the town. She got off early on day and went to go home on the bus. She paid just as everyone else did and noticing that the all black section was full she sat in the ‘neutral’ section where blacks and whites could sit. After the bus driver told her to get up once the bus became crowded, Rosa stood her ground. Even being threatened she did not move, she was soon arrested. A lady named Jo Ann Robinson who was a colored professor and the president of Woman’s Political Council rallied 25 women who worked hard making posters that said “No Riders Today, Support Mrs. Parks” “Stay Off the Bus.” Martin Luther King became their spokes person. People from all around started sending shoes so people in Montgomery Alabama could walk. After a year in November of 1956 the Supreme Court ruled that segregation on buses was illegal.
Response: I have seen several books and heard many stories on the Rosa Parks sit down on the bus. But I really liked this one! I thought the pictures were great and I liked how the story told what needed to be said and no more. I think this will allow the young reader to stay interested and make the facts easier to see. I really like how the illustrator mentions that he used a yellowish hue throughout all the pictures because when he visited Alabama the first thing he noticed was the heat.
Teaching ideas: I might have a younger classroom (2-3) graders make posters like Jo Ann did, I would have them make up their own catchy slogan or sentence. This allows them to be creative while also, hopefully, creating a spark in them to show simple ways to voice ones opinion.
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