Customer Reviews

Time For Kids: Rosa Parks: Civil Rights Pioneer

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This is one in a series of inexpensive but superbly produced biographies created for younger readers (ages 7-9) that enable them to gain a much better understanding and appreciation of key figures throughout U.S. history, most of whom also had significant impact worldwide. That is certainly true of Rosa Parks (February 4, 1913 - October 24, 2005). As is true of the other volumes in this series, this mini-biography is based on rock-solid historical material and includes a number of archival photos to supplement the lively narrative created by the Time editors in collaboration with Karen Kellaher. I feel obligated to add, that this is not a book written for younger "dummies" or "idiots." It ought to be in all school and public libraries and would be an excellent birthday or holiday gift for children, one that parents, grandparents, and other relatives should consider.

To this day, a false but remarkably durable misunderstanding suggests that, on December 1, 1955, when Rosa Parks "stepped onto a bus - and into history," she refused to give up her seat on a bus to a white man, she did so only because she was tired after another long and wearying day of work as a seamstress in a department store in Montgomery, Alabama. "People always say that I didn't give up my seat because I was tired, but that isn't true.... No, the only tired I was, was tired of giving in." "Rosa hated segregation, and she hoped that the laws would change one day. But she did not know that her own act of courage would lead the way," as indeed it did.

In this volume, we learn about her childhood and life on a farm, her experiences in a culture that was separate but hardly equal, her "act of courage," the bus boycott that followed, her active involvement in the civil rights movement, her friendship with Martin Luther King, Jr., and her various activities in later years such as the Rosa and Raymond Parks Institute for Self Development until declining health prevented her from traveling, participating in freedom marches, and delivering speeches. In 1996, she was awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom and, three years later, the Congressional Gold Medal. She died at the age of ninety-two. According to Congressman John Conyers for whom she worked in his Detroit office for many years, "Rosa Parks showed us that everybody counts. When we all decide to do something, it amounts to a wave of energy that can indeed change things. She taught us that nobody should be held back because of their skin color. Each individual is important and powerful. That was her gift to us." And that will continue to be her gift to generations to come.

Those who wish to learn more about Rosa Parks are urged to check out her autobiography, Rosa Parks: My Story with Jim Haskins as well as Douglas Brinkley's Rosa Parks: A Life, Faith Ringgold's If A Bus Could Talk: The Story of Rosa Parks, The Story of Rosa Parks co-authored by Patricia A. Pingry and Steven Walker, Rosa co-authored by Nikki Giovanni and Bryan Collier, Quiet Strength by Rosa Parks and Gregory J. Reed, and Rosa Parks and the Montgomery Bus Boycott co-authored by Connie Colwell Miller and Dan Kalal.

We used books from this series for A biography unit in our third grade class. The students found them accessible and interesting, with plenty of magazine quality photos and informative captions. The students read them in two 15 minute sessions, followed by independent note taking on a worksheet formatted by topic. Spot on for their academic needs and developmental level.