SLIS 5970.001, Mini Mester
Multicultural Literature
Activity
About the Book: The book opens with a quote
from Robert Frost, “Before I built a wall I’d ask to know, What I was walling
in or walling out…” which sets the tone for the book Talking Walls. The book
features fourteen famous walls from across the world with excerpts about the
walls, how they were built and/or found and what their significance is to the
respective cultures. The double-spread
pictures are lively and clearly transmit the messages the walls want you to see
and hear. The illustrations are
inhabited by a multitude of people across many ethnic backgrounds demonstrating
that the walls we build affect us all.
About the Author: Margy Burns Knight is a
mother and an English-as-a-Second-Language teacher from Winthrop Maine. She served as a Peace Corps Volunteer in
Nigeria, and as a teacher in Switzerland.
In addition to Talking Walls, she
has produced a touring multi-media show about Cambodia with refugee students
and written the books Who Belongs Here?,
Welcoming Babies, Talking Walls: The Stories Continue and Africa is Not a Country. Margy works
actively in diversity education and works with teachers and children across the
country in workshops that help children explore the connections between
different cultures, appreciate the differences, and share their stories as a
means of developing tolerance and celebrating diversity.
About the
Illustrator: Anne
Sibley O’Brien grew up in a bi-cultural society as the daughter of American
medical missionaries in Korea. Instead of living in a missionary compound, her
parents chose to live among the Korean people and eventually moved to the
remote island of Kojedo, were Annie learned how the work of an individual could
be crucial to the survival of others on a day-to-day basis. Annie attended
college in the United States, returning to Korea for her junior year to study
Korean arts. She also became politically active, working in the McGovern
campaign and attending anti-racism workshops. She learned that illustration
work can be a political act when it seeks to create empathy. Her characters
show real people, not stereotypes, as she communicates the beauty and worth of
each individual. Annie has taught Korean at the Korean United Methodist Church
in Portland, serves on Portland's Bias Crime Task Force, is an active member of
the National Coalition Building Institute, has served on the United Methodist
Commission on Religion and Race, and is active in diversity education in
schools across the country.
Before Reading
Activity: The
students will answer the following questions within their groups. Afterwards, a class list will be written
which includes the various answers for the questions.
1.
What
is a wall?
2.
How
are walls used in our school?
3.
What
purposes do walls serve?
4.
What
is a talking wall?
5.
What
can walls tell us?
After Reading
Activity:
·
Internet
Activity – Students will take a virtual
tour of Churchill Road School’s Wall Museum at http://www.fcps.k12.va.us/ChurchillRoadES/crs9899/events/walls/index.htm
and list the different types of walls created by the school children.
· Group Activity – As a class we will discuss what we observed at the Wall Museum and compare and contrast findings with the reading and our initial answers to pre-reading activity.
Additional
Reading:
· Knight, Margy Burns. Talking Walls: The Stories Continue.
Ill. Ann Sibley O’Brien. Maine: Tilbury House, 1992.
· Bunting, Eve. The Wall. Ill. Donald Carrick. New York:
Houghton Mifflin, 1992.