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Resilience and Resistance: Japanese American Stories in Children's Literature During Remembrance Day

2/25/2025

 

by Amber Moore on behalf of the CLA Student Committee

Last week was the observation of Remembrance Day (February 19), a date that solemnly acknowledges the anniversary ofExecutive Order 9066, which authorized the unjust incarceration of Japanese Americans during WWII, it's particularly meaningful to examine how children's literature helps young readers understand this history. While these stories emerge from one of America's darkest chapters, they also illuminate extraordinary examples of resilience, resistance, and reconciliation that embody core American values. Two contemporary children's books offer powerful entry points for young readers to engage with this complex history while celebrating the strength of the Japanese American community.

Breaking Barriers Through Sport: Wat Kept Playing  by Emily Inouye Huey

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Emily Inouye Huey's picture book biography of Wataru "Wat" Misaka provides an inspiring narrative of resistance through athletic achievement. As the first person of color to play in what would become the NBA, Misaka's story demonstrates how talent and determination can transcend racial barriers - even during a time of widespread discrimination against Japanese Americans.
 
The timing of Misaka's achievements makes his story particularly powerful. His success on the basketball court came even as Japanese Americans faced incarceration and prejudice during WWII. His later drafting by the New York Knicks represented not just personal triumph but a symbolic victory in the ongoing struggle for recognition of Japanese Americans as full participants in American society. Through basketball, Misaka found a way to be seen for his abilities rather than his ethnicity, challenging the very prejudices that led to Executive Order 9066.

Community and Connection in Those Who Helped Us: Assisting Japanese Americans During the War by Ken Mochizuki (Author) and Kiku Hughes (Illustrator)

Ken Mochizuki's graphic novel Those Who Helped Us approaches the incarceration period from a different but equally vital perspective, highlighting stories of solidarity between Japanese Americans and their neighbors. Through protagonist Sumiko Tanaka's eyes, readers witness both the trauma of forced removal and the courage of those who chose to stand against injustice. The story demonstrates how bonds of friendship and community persisted even in the face of government-sanctioned discrimination.
 
What makes this book particularly powerful for young readers is its focus on relationships and human connection. While honestly depicting the hardships of incarceration, it also shows how acts of kindness and solidarity helped sustain hope and dignity. The story reminds us that even in America's darkest moments, there were people who chose to uphold fundamental American values of justice and equality.
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Teaching Difficult History Through Children's Literature

Both books demonstrate how children's literature can serve as an effective medium for helping young readers engage with challenging historical topics. Through age-appropriate storytelling and compelling individual narratives, they make this complex history accessible while emphasizing themes of resilience and resistance rather than victimization. By sharing these narratives with young readers, we help ensure that future generations understand this history while drawing inspiration from those who exemplified core American values even in the darkest of times.
 
The stories found in Wat Kept Playing and Those Who Helped Us remind us that the Japanese American incarceration experience, while representing a grievous violation of American principles, also revealed extraordinary examples of the American spirit through acts of resistance, resilience, and reconciliation. These children's books help ensure that as we remember this history, we honor not just the injustice but also the indomitable spirit of those who endured it.
 
Both books can be purchased through the Japanese American National Museum and the Wing Luke Museum. For additional content to share with students, please visit Densho.org, a site dedicated to “preserving Japanese American stories of the past for the generations of tomorrow.”
Amber Moore is a Ph.D. student at N.C. State University and a CLA Student Committee Member. In 2024, Amber was one of the recipients of the Vivian Yenika-Agbaw Grant.

Exploring Heart & Hope with Biographies: The 2024 CLA Expert Class

10/21/2024

 

By Mary Ann Cappiello, Sara K. Sterner, and Kathy Short

Saturday, November 23, 2024 from 5:45 PM - 7:00 PM EST  Room 102 A, Boston Convention & Exhibition Center
Official Session Link: Children’s Literature Assembly Expert Class: Exploring Heart & Hope with Biographies
The Biography Clearinghouse
The Children’s Literature Assembly (CLA) has sponsored a Master Class at the annual NCTE Convention since 1994. This guaranteed session provides K-12 teachers and teacher educators with the opportunity to gain insight about the use of children’s literature through interactions with leading scholars, authors, and illustrators in the field. In 2023 at our 30th Annual session, we debuted our new name: the Expert Class.
 
In collaboration with The Biography Clearinghouse, an affiliated project of The Children’s Literature Assembly, the 31st annual Expert Class, “Exploring Heart & Hope with Biographies,” showcases the many ways in which picturebook biographies can be used across the curriculum for a range of purposes. This is an exciting opportunity to expand engagement with biographies as well as increase participants' biography related repertoire in their classrooms.  
 
The concept of “a biography clearinghouse” began at the 2018 NCTE convention in Houston, when author Barb Rosenstock asked what could be done to go beyond genre study and elevate the role of biography in classrooms across the curriculum. Ideas began to percolate amongst Barb, former members of NCTE’s Orbis Pictus Committee, and fellow author Tonya Bolden, and while sheltering at home at the height of the COVID-19 pandemic, the team created “The Biography Clearinghouse.” Readers of the CLA blog may already be familiar with the work that appeared here 2020-2023.

The Biography Clearinghouse believes that:

  • High-quality, well-written biographies are multidimensional and multi-layered. As students explore the ways in which the book operates, and the decisions the author and illustrator made, they also use the biographies as vehicles for learning about the world.
  • Because of the increasing diversity of subjects, biographies are one of our best tools for diversifying the curriculum K-8.
  • Biographies can infuse the language arts, science, social studies, math, and integrated arts curriculum with models of agency and perseverance.
 
To help facilitate this work in K-8 classrooms, the Clearinghouse created a three-part framework: Investigate, Explore, and Create.
Inverstigate, Explore, Create Framework
This year’s class provides a unique opportunity for rich discussions about and experiences with picturebook biographies. After an initial introduction to the Investigate-Explore-Create framework, participants will rotate between four roundtables to experience activities and conversations rooted in each component. At one table, Barb Rosenstock and Scott Riley will focus on “Investigate,” and engage in conversation about the process of researching and writing biographies. Participants will “Explore” content and disciplinary thinking with Amina Chaudhri at one table and socio-emotional learning with Jenn Graff at another. At the fourth roundtable, Erika Thulin Dawes will engage attendees in the final part of the framework, “Create.”
 
We’ll conclude the session by sharing a Library Thing database of over 350 picturebook biographies (with tags)! This process will allow attendees to engage in dialogue about the power of biography and consider new ways to conceptualize how to bring the genre into their classes with more heart and hope. Everyone will leave the 2024 Expert Class filled with the wonder of biographies and ideas for new opportunities to bring biographies into the lives of children and tweens.
 
We are excited to share this biography party with you!  While building connections and learning together, we’ll share some vegan and gluten-free snacks (it’s late afternoon, and everyone might be a bit peckish). The Expert Class will close with the awarding of biography-based door prizes to bring home along with your new ideas and expertise.

Mary Ann Cappiello, Sara K. Sterner, and Kathy Short serve as the 2024 CLA Expert Class Committee.
 
  • Mary Ann is a Professor of Language & Literacy at Lesley University
  • Sara is an Associate Professor of Elementary Education at Cal-Poly Humboldt University and a CLA Board Member
  • Kathy is a Professor of Teaching, Learning & Sociocultural Studies at The University of Arizona and a CLA Board Member

Other CLA offerings during NCTE 2024

Notables
CLA Breakfast
Art Auction

Looking Back with Biographies

12/18/2023

 

By The Biography Clearinghouse 

As we come to the end of another calendar year, we reflect upon how much the world can change in just a few short months. Political turmoil, violence, and war threaten the lives of millions. Climate scientists tell us that 2023 was the hottest year on record. Devastating fires and floods ravaged cities, towns, and forests alike. These catastrophes may feel unique to our life experience, so it helps to remember that people before us have faced hardships too.

Again, we turn to biographies to learn from the people among us and those who came before us. What lessons in leadership can we find? How do artists, faith leaders, scientists, activists, educators, and others work towards goals? Handle setbacks? Cope with prejudice? Persevere while facing devastation? Work collaboratively to create change? 

In this year-end blog entry, we share a few picture book biographies from 2022 and 2023 that were inspiring to us, as well as preview a 2024 biography. 

With best wishes for peace in the New Year,

The Biography Clearinghouse Team 


A Song for The Unsung: Bayard Rustin, the Man Behind the 1963 March on Washington
by Carole Boston Weatherford & Rob Sanders, illustrations by Bryan McCray (November 2022, Henry Holt and Co.)

It takes a person with extraordinary skills to organize an event as tremendous as the 1963 March on Washington. Bayard Rustin was primed for this event from a young age and across the span of his life. In A Song for the Unsung, we learn that his grandmother instilled in him Quaker values, and the importance of civic engagement; that Rustin practiced civil disobedience by resisting racism; that he endured homophobia even among the civil rights activists beside whom he struggled; and that along with being dedicated to non-violent resistance, he was a talented singer who knew the power of music to move and inspire. The creators of this biography pay tribute to Bayard Rustin with reverential grace and beauty, rendering him simultaneously sturdy and vulnerable, amid gorgeous mixed media illustrations. In the classroom, A Song for the Unsung can inspire conversation about the qualities of leaders such as Rustin, the legacy of the march (documented in the backmatter), and protest music (while listening to the songs listed on each page). 

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Game of Freedom: Mestre Bimba and the Art of Capoeira
by Duncan Tonatiuh (October 2023, Abrams) 

In Game of Freedom, Duncan Tonatiuh tells the story of Manuel Dos Reis Machado, or Mestre Bimba as he is best known, and his role in uplifting capoeira from a marginalized and persecuted practice to an internationally recognized artform. The book starts at the turn of the 20th century in Brazil’s state of Bahia during Bimba’s childhood, when it was illegal to play capoeira in public. Skillfully interweaving exposition within the book’s narrative arc, Tonatiuh describes capoeira as a form of artistic cultural expression combining “music, fighting, theatrics, and dance” with deep roots within the culture of the Black descendants of formerly enslaved Africans, and explicitly links the harassment of capoeiristas to racial prejudice. After learning to play capoeira as a teenager, Bimba began to teach others but bristled at the disrespect and continuing persecution of the practice. In what follows, Tonatiuh offers an informative unspooling of how social and political change are slowly built. Readers learn that, determined to change matters, Bimba developed a new capoeira style and established a school or academia for teaching it and participated in a series of challenge bouts that increased the game’s visibility. Bimba’s efforts, in combination with the opening of other academies and the development of other capoeira styles, helped shift the public’s perception of the game and led to its complete decriminalization in 1953. The book’s backmatter includes a glossary and a rich author’s note.
 
Utilizing his distinctive stylized illustration style, that is influenced by pre-Columbian art, Tonatiuh captures the beauty and the fluidity of capoeira and of the Brazilian historical contexts of Mestre Bimba’s life. Particularly poignant is the depiction of enslaved ancestors as reversed silhouettes in select illustrations of capoeiristas. Readers may notice some slight departures from Tonatiuh’s typical rendering in the shape of the characters’ ears, but most notably in the en face depiction of some of the capoeira players. 

Go Forth and Tell: The Life of Augusta Baker, Librarian and Master Storyteller
by Breana McDaniel, illustrated by April Harrison (January 2024, Dial/Penguin)

Throughout 2023, school and public librarians have served as guardians of free speech, putting their careers on the line to support young people’s access to diverse books. These librarians, to whom we owe so much, are part of a long line of librarian activists creating change for their communities and beyond. Augusta Baker was one such leader. Baker curated a list of Black book creators for the young people with whom she worked at the 135th Street Branch Library in Harlem, fostered the careers of many Black authors, from Virginia Hamilton to Walter Dean Meyers, and became the first Black coordinator of children’s services within the New York City Library System. Baker was also an author and storyteller in her own right, teaching storytelling at Columbia University and becoming “Storyteller in Residence” at the University of South Carolina. McDaniels’ writing moves, propelling readers forward through varied sentences, alliteration, and just enough information. Hamilton’s gorgeous mixed media collages, saturated in warm colors of yellow, orange, and green, envelop readers in the warmth of Baker’s presence in the library and in the classroom. Backmatter includes a timeline, author’s note, and citations list. Go Forth and Tell would be a wonderful read alongside picture book biographies of fellow New York City librarian, storyteller, and changemaker Pura Belpré such as Planting Stories: The Life of Librarian and Storyteller Pura Belpré (Denise, 2019) and Pura’s Cuentos: How Pura Belpré Reshaped Libraries with her Stories (Pimentel 2021), and Schomburg: The Man Who Built a Library (Weatherford, 2017).   

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Hope is an Arrow: The Story of Lebanese American Poet Kahlil Gibran
by Cory McCarthy, illustrated by Ekua Holmes (July 2022, Candlewick)

Khalil Gibran believed and held on to the universals of love and togetherness as he navigated his life as an outsider traversing between cultures.  He moved back and forth between his homeland of Lebanon, and Boston, in the United States.  The seeds for his greatest work of writing, The Prophet, were sewn in his continuous back and forth between cultures.  Actual pieces from this famous book, which has been translated into more than 40 languages, are woven into this story.  The snippets offer readers a glimpse of how his life may have engendered and connected to his famous writings.  It was his art and poetry which helped Khalil Gibran persevere through incredible challenges and helped him communicate his ideas across cultures.  There is a good chance that students who have grown up with more than one culture will connect with his story.  It may provide teachers an opportunity to introduce students to some of Khalil Gibran’s work and dig in more and could invite students to communicate some of the larger feelings and ideas in their lives through poetry and art, much like he did.

Tiny Jumper: How Tiny Broadwick Created the Parachute Rip Cord
by Candy Dahl, illustrated by Maithili Joshi (October 2023, Little Bee Books)

Born as a “tiny” baby, but with tremendous courage, Tiny Broadwick was the inventor of the parachute rip cord and named the “First Lady of Parachuting.” Despite enduring embarrassing stunts like dressing up as a baby in order to do what she loved, Tiny knew she belonged in the air and took action to make her dreams a reality. After establishing herself as a prolific hot air jumper, Tiny persevered and entered a world where no woman had gone before- parachuting from airplanes. In Tiny Jumper, Dahl and Joshi show what determination, bravery, and unique interests can accomplish. Joshi’s dynamic illustrations and the incorporation of quotes from Tiny Broadwick throughout the running text bring this incredible woman’s story to life. Tiny Jumper inspires readers to follow their passions, against all odds, even when they seem up in the clouds.
Tiny Jumper Cover

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Christo and Jean Claude Wrap the World
by G. Neri, illustrated by Elizabeth Haidle (March 2023, Candlewick)

One of the greatest gifts artists offer humanity is the invitation to see the world in new ways. This is certainly the case with environmental artists Christo and Jean-Claude, the subjects of a new picture book written by G. Neri and illustrated by Elizabeth Haidle. Imagine walking through a city and suddenly noticing a car or even a giant building completely wrapped in fabric or finding a brightly colored floating path from a lakeshore to an island, where none had been the day before. These projects and more are featured by Neri who employs a constructed dialogue between the two artists to convey their life stories, their unique installations, and the goals that guided their public art making.  Haidle’s mixed media illustrations match the playful creative nature of the artists’ collaboration, incorporating frames, speech bubbles, and marvelous renderings of the oversize and surprising works of art. Helpful back matter includes additional details about the married couple’s life stories, a note about the author’s sources and how the dialogue was composed, and ‘fun facts’ about the art. This engaging biography compels consideration of important questions such as: What is art? Who owns art? Who experiences art? Can art be temporary? How does art impact our lives?
Biobraphy Clearinhouse Logo
The Biography Clearinghouse is a website aiming "to support educators in sharing biographies with young people." The site includes several resources, including a framework for teaching with biographies, interviews with biography authors and illustrators, and a portfolio of book entries. Recent entries:
  • Impossible Escape by Steve Sheinkin
  • A Life of Service: The Story of Tammy Duckworth by Christina Soontornvat,
    Illustrated by Dow Phumiruk

The Biography Clearinghouse Team is comprised of book creators and educators of different levels.

Winter Hiatus Announcement

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Interrogating History, Perspective, and Nonfiction Writing with Steve Sheinkin’s "Impossible Escape"

10/10/2023

 

By Mary Ann Cappiello & Xenia Hadjioannou on behalf of the Biography Clearinghouse

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Recently, the Biography Clearinghouse interviewed author Steve Sheinkin about his latest nonfiction book, Impossible Escape: A True Story of Survival and Heroism in Nazi Europe. Action-packed and filled with dramatic tension and intricate historical details, Sheinkin shares the experiences of Rudi Vrba and Greta Sidonová, two Jewish teenagers during World War II.

While the full video interview and transcript are available on our website, covering a range of questions regarding Sheinkin’s research and writing processes, we share an edited portion of it here on the CLA blog as an example of the complex decision-making that goes into writing narrative nonfiction for tween and teen readers. 

Interview Question
As you were working on the book and revising it, how did you balance crafting a narrative that builds tension, which as you mentioned earlier, gets the reader hooked and builds the narrative towards that climactic moment, and the need for exposition, which is oftentimes in the case of this book exposition about very difficult topics? What were the moments where you knew that you had to interrupt the action, pause the action to provide that information for your readers?

Steve Sheinkin’s Answer (edited for brevity): 
That’s doing narrative nonfiction for middle grade and YA, I think. That's my career essentially, trying to figure out how to do that……

I used to write textbooks. That's… you see how hesitant I was to confess that? But I used to write history textbooks where they don't have that problem. It's all just boring facts and figures and names and dates. And so I just don't want to ever do that. I'm still sorry and making amends for doing that. So I want it to be just story. And then I realize, wait a minute. I can’t be. I get jealous of people who write for adults because they could just say, “and then Pearl Harbor happened,” and then everyone knows what that means. I can't do that, and fair enough I shouldn't be able to, because it's unfair of me to assume that someone who's 12 or 14 has that background information, and they shouldn't have to, to pick up the book. I think that's part of what makes this, hopefully, makes one of my books valuable, is that they don't have to have background information….

I guess I hope it works that I start with just story…I am seeing all the best scenes where there's really well documented moments that have those elements of a scene that you want as a writer. .. You don't need to know them right away, but you do need to know them pretty early on, and that's why the first third of a book like this is always the hardest part. It’s kind of like a juggling act once the balls are going. It's okay. But getting them all in the air in the right order is the hard part. And so I'll write little bits of context. In this case the rise of Adolf Hitler, what the Nazis were doing. How anti-semitism was such, so central, to what the Nazis did, and and all of that…

I end up writing way too much of that, and I always do, and then kind of pare it down until it starts to feel right, and I work with my editor on that kind of stuff more than any other part of the book. I don't like to write the whole thing and then send it to her. I specifically like to try to write that first third as a draft and send it to her because it's just never, never good at first. It always has that problem of being clunky, and either not starting fast enough or we're not getting to the context soon enough, and those are kind of at odds with each other. 

You can get it right with enough back and forth, and trial and error… It's kind of like making a movie. You film both. You film all the scenes. You don't have to decide right away what order you're gonna edit them together in, but you know they're all going to be there.

Teaching Ideas

There are many different roles this fast-paced and moving book can play in the English Language Arts and Social Studies classroom. Below are two examples. For more, please see our full entry on Impossible Escape.
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Punctuating Narrative with Exposition

Throughout Impossible Escape, Steve Sheinkin builds a tight narrative filled with action. Reading like a movie or a novel, the storyline builds tension, takes twists and turns, and moves towards a dramatic turning point and conclusion. But the book isn’t only the storyline. At times,  Sheinkin zooms in on a single event, within a single story, and then zooms out to provide a larger context or reveal a pattern across people and time.  

For example, on page 24, an old woman approaches Rudi, who is locked up in a small cell after getting beaten up and arrested in Hungary after fleeing Slovakia. She addresses him as “Mr. Jew” as she drops some food and cigarettes in his cell. Then Sheinkin begins to zoom out from this single event to note: “A kind gesture, but ominous also. He wasn’t a teenager anymore, not to most of the people in what he’d thought was his country.” In a further zoom out, Sheinkin goes on to explain that antisemitism was “hardly new in Europe,” and provides a brief overview of antisemitism across the centuries, from the medieval period to the 20th century. Sheinkin leverages the dramatic moment within his narrative to provide readers with necessary background knowledge to understand more deeply the dangers Rudi and Gerta and their friends and families faced. 

Ask your students what they notice about this scene on page 24 and the exposition that follows. What do they learn? Why did Sheinkin pause the narrative? Why is this information important? After having that conversation, play the portion of our interview with Sheinkin, where he discusses how, why, and when he punctuates narration with exposition: 00:22:36.190 -->  00:27:47.800. 

After discussing the video segment, have students 
  • Identify similar moments where narrative is punctuated by exposition throughout the book as well as in any other narrative nonfiction texts they might be reading. 
  • Practice this writing strategy by researching a historical event as a class - perhaps the Holocaust and World War II, perhaps something else related to your curriculum - and each writing a short narrative that includes important information in exposition.

Embracing Point of View in Nonfiction Writing

Nonfiction writing is often described as factual and objective, where the author and their perspective have no place. However, as noted in NCTE’s (2023) Position Statement on nonfiction literature, “though nonfiction has traditionally been thought of as offering an authoritative treatment of its topics, it is important for readers to understand that nonfiction, no matter how well researched and thorough, represents the authors’ perspectives and points of view.”  

In Impossible Escape readers can infer how Steve Sheinkin is positioned toward the events and the issues at hand by noticing how he chooses to describe them. For instance, he explicitly characterizes antisemitic stereotypes as garbage (p.8) and being “rooted in ignorance and lies” (p. 24).  Similarly, when Sheinkin writes about what Gerta did during the last months of the war, his admiration for her is clear when he notes: “Even after all her close call, she chose not to play it safe.” 

Steve Sheinkin as the author becomes even more clearly visible when he addresses the reader by asking rhetorical questions that pull us out of the narrative and prompt us to grapple with some weighty material. In our interview, Steve offers some valuable insight into his decision to use rhetorical questions (starting at 30:55).

At the very end of the book, Steve Sheinkin admits that he struggled with figuring out how to conclude the book, thinking that he needed to come up with a way to sum up the book with “some profound message to apply to daily life” (p. 219) and admitting that “this last little section was the hardest for me to write” (p. 219). You can hear Steve discuss this decision in the interview, starting at 34:39. In the end, he took a lesson from Rudi Vrba himself who would say that “the story is the thing” and encourage his audience to draw their own conclusions and interpretations. It is an interesting contrast to traditional storytelling that often ends with an explicit lesson or moral.
Invite students to look for the author while reading Impossible Escape as well as other nonfiction texts. How do those glimpses help readers infer the book creators’ emotional and intellectual positioning toward their topic? 


After finishing the book, encourage students to sit with the last few sentences: “Everything is in the story. You read the story. You know what to do” (p. 219).  Invite them to respond in any way that makes sense. That could involve writing, drawing, painting, or recording.  Plan a gallery walk or other opportunities for sharing these responses. 

When students are writing their next nonfiction text, encourage them to engage emotionally with their material, and to insert themselves in some way in the text.
Mary Ann Cappiello teaches courses in children’s literature and literacy methods at Lesley University and is a founding member of The Biography Clearinghouse. She is co-chair of CLA's Expert Class committee and a former chair of NCTE’s Orbis Pictus Award for Outstanding Nonfiction K-8.

Xenia Hadjioannou is associate professor of language and literacy education at the Berks campus of Penn State University. She is president of CLA and co-editor of the CLA Blog. She is a founding member of The Biography Clearinghouse.
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Search & Explore the Biography Clearinghouse’s Collection on Library Thing!

12/13/2022

 

By Xenia Hadjioannou & Mary Ann Cappiello on behalf of the Biography Clearinghouse

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Wondering how to find and curate biographies suited to the interests of your students or to your curricular needs? Frustrated by a piecemeal approach, cross-referencing booklists, award lists, and Google searches? The Biography Clearinghouse has a year end gift for you! 

We have created a collection of biographies for young people on LibraryThing, an online book cataloging service. The collection makes use of “tags” with which users can use to guide and focus their searches. This continually updated collection is intended as a tool for educators of all subjects and age groups, librarians, and anyone else who enjoys and works with biographies. We are busily tagging the books in our collection and will continue to add and tag more titles!

The best part about it? You can access our collection for free and without having to sign up for an account. You can search the collection by theme, literary elements, geographic location, format feature, profession/discipline, etc.  

To learn how to access, navigate, and search through the Biography Clearinghouse Collection review the information below.

How do I access the Biography Clearinghouse Collection?

Simply go to https://www.librarything.com/catalog/Teachwithbios. There you will see our entire catalog listing. In the “Tags” column you will see all the tags assigned to each book by members of the Biography Clearinghouse. 

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How do I search through your catalog? 

  • I am looking for information on a particular biography. How do I search through your catalog?
If you already know the title of the book you are looking for, type it in the “Search this Library” field and hit search. You can also search by author or illustrator names.
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For more advanced search options, you can click on the triangle next to the “Search this library” field to expand the search menu. You can then use the available options to constrain your search.
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  • I am looking for biographies on a particular topic/theme or with certain characteristics. How do I run my search?
The easiest way to conduct a keyword search through our catalog is through our “Tags” list. To access our “Tags” list click on the “Tags” tab. The number in parenthesis next to each tag represents the number of biographies in our catalog to which that tag has been assigned.

Clicking on a tag will produce a listing of all books in our catalog we have annotated with it.

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Have any questions? Biographies to add to our collection? Suggested tags? Please email us at [email protected]. We’d love to hear from you.
Xenia Hadjioannou is an Associate Professor of Language and Literacy Education at the Berks campus of Penn State University where she teaches and works with preservice teachers through various courses in language and literacy methodology. Xenia is the co-author of Translanguaging for Emergent Bilinguals. She is the Vice President and Website Manager of the Children's Literature Assembly, and a co-editor of The CLA Blog. 

Mary Ann Cappiello is a Professor of Language and Literacy at Lesley University, where she teaches courses in children’s literature and literacy methods. For twelve years, she blogged about teaching with children’s literature at The Classroom Bookshelf. She is a former chair of NCTE’s Orbis Pictus Award for Outstanding Nonfiction K-8. Mary Ann is the coauthor of Text Sets in Action: Pathways Through Content Area Literacy (2021).

Teaching and Learning Opportunities with Make Meatballs Sing

5/30/2022

 

By Denise Dávila on Behalf of the Biography Clearinghouse

Regarded as The Rebel Nun, the Pop Art Nun, and Andy Warhol's Kindred Spirit,  Sister Corita Kent (1918–1986) was a member of the Immaculate Heart Community of Los Angeles, California.  She created multimodal art prints that were social commentaries on poverty, injustice, and war.  As the artist of "The Rainbow Swash" (1971), the largest copyrighted rainbow in the world, and the designer of  US Postal Service's best selling "Love Stamp” (1985), Sister Corita also used her art and her voice to promote the kind of hope, love, and kindness that overcomes barriers and unites people. 

In the highly acclaimed picturebook biography Make Meatballs Sing: The Life and Art of Corita Kent (2021, Enchanted Lion Books), author Matthew Burgess and illustrator Kara Kramer engage readers in a multimodal exploration of an extraordinary person’s life and legacy that resulted in nearly “800 serigraph editions, thousands of watercolors, and innumerable public and private commissions” according to The Corita Art Center of Los Angeles, CA. Learn more about Corita Kent at:  www.corita.org.

The Biography Clearinghouse entry for Make Meatballs Sing includes and interview with Matthew Burgess and several recommendations for working with the book. Below is an excerpt of the teaching ideas in the entry.
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Free Curriculum Guide

Using Viewfinders

Sister Corita Kent authored provocative multimodal compositions that were inspired by looking closely at ordinary objects and were imbued with intertextual meanings.  As suggested in Make Meatballs Sing, much of her work began by focusing her attention on specific elements and blocking out others.  She employed cardboard viewfinders with her students as tools for developing the skill of looking.  These next activities build upon the use of viewfinders in the classroom.  They are adapted from the Make Meatballs Sing Curriculum Guide.

If you have 1 - 2 hours


Make and Use Viewfinders
Invite students to make viewfinders, like those Sister Corita Kent asked her students to create, from everyday materials like recycled cardboard, heavy paper, or cardstock. Encourage students to use their finders to examine things in their classrooms, schools, homes, neighborhoods, and other venues.  Take a walking field trip in the vicinity of the school to take a closer look and find unexpected surprises. After returning to the classroom, invite students to write about what they noticed and to discuss their experiences in looking and seeing in a different way.  

If you have 1 - 2 days


Develop a Scavenger Hunt
Invite students to develop a scavenger hunt for another looking tour.  Welcome them to generate ideas for their types of objects, shapes, attributes, or other elements they should look on the tour. For example, students might search for things that are green, billowy, jagged, smooth, angular, etc.  Encourage students to bring a sketchbook to capture the images they find during the scavenger hunt.  Alternatively, they could use digital cameras to document their findings.  Upon returning to the classroom, encourage students to identify their favorite "find" from the hunt and to contribute it to a class collage.  Students could collaborate in the creation of a visual patchwork akin with the art collage that appears on the back jacket of Make Meatballs Sing.

If you have 1 - 2 weeks


Create a Multimodal Composition for Screen Painting  
Invite students to use their findings from their scavenger hunts to create multimodal compositions that incorporate images and texts.  Present an array of Sister Corita’s prints as models.  Encourage students to incorporate epigraphs or quotes from texts that are meaningful to them. Alternatively and/or additionally, invite students to create images based on their looking exercises that could be used for a simple screen painting project.  Several resources are available online for creating serigraphy with students.  Here is one approach that uses embroidery frames.
Denise Dávila is an assistant professor at the University of Texas at Austin. She studies children’s literature and researches the home literacy practices of families with young children in under-resourced communities.

Teaching and Learning Possibilities with Duncan Tonatiuh's "Soldier for Equality"

5/17/2022

 

 By Erika Thulin Dawes and Xenia Hadjioannou on behalf of the Biography Clearinghouse

Soldier for Equality Cover
We close out the school year immersed in social strife and conflict. Our students are grappling both with big questions about humanity and substantial uncertainties about everyday life. Recent research describes rising mental health concerns for young people (Acheson, 2020; Cowie & Myers, 2021; Samji et al. 2022)  and it’s not surprising that maintaining optimism is challenging in the context of war, a global pandemic, and climate change. As educators, we are seeking ways to provide our students with grounding and with hope. And we believe that biographies, life stories of inspiring people, can help to provide both an anchor and inspiration. Our latest Biography Clearinghouse entry features Duncan Tonatiuh’s picturebook biography Soldier for Equality: José de la Luz Sáenz and the Great War. Using his trademark illustrative style, digital collage inspired by Mixtec Pre-Columbian art, Tonatiuh describes the World War I experiences of ‘Luz’; a teacher, activist, Texan, and a person with Mexican heritage. 

Toniatiuh’s biography of José de la Luz Sáenz is a powerful narrative of the transformative power of literacy. Luz’s education and multilingualism were instrumental in his life trajectory; his knowledge allowed him to navigate the battlefield safely, keeping him out of the trenches and instead in a fortified command post for the intelligence service. He developed his skills in organizing while teaching English to Mexican American soldiers. And upon his return to teaching when the war was over, he turned his outrage over unequal schooling for Mexican American children into activism, establishing the League of United Latin American Citizens (LULAC), an organization that helped to end the segregation of Latinx children from white schools.

In our Biography Clearinghouse entry, we provide an interview with Duncan Tonatiuh and a collection of teaching ideas to support student exploration of Soldier for Equality. These teaching ideas encourage students to consider the transformative power of literacy and the generative power of community organizing and activism. They include: an exploration of translanguaging and theme development in picturebooks; a history of and contemporary look at the experience of minoritized populations in the United States army; a call to allyship to counter bullying; a visual literacy exercise exploring traditional artistic motifs; and a tribute to teacher activists.

Below is an excerpt of the teaching ideas in the Biography Clearinghouse entry for Soldier for Equality: José de la Luz Sáenz and the Great War:

Social Justice Concerns in Personal Lives and Society

Throughout his life, Luz identified injustices levied against Mexican Americans, and engaged in purposeful actions to work against these injustices and promote equity. In Soldier for Equality, readers encounter several instances of prejudice and discrimination against Luz, because of his status as a Mexican American. Readers also get to see purposeful actions Luz is taking to fight against these injustices. 

As a class, create parallel lists of (a) instances of prejudicial treatment Luz encountered and (b) purposeful actions he took to work against those injustices and bring about equality and fair treatment. 
  • At the micro/personal level: Invite students to locate instances of prejudicial treatment and unfairness in their daily lives. Are there certain people who are persistently teased, gossiped about, called names, bullied, or excluded? What would be some specific purposeful actions they could take to work against those patterns of mistreatment and exclusion?
  • At the macro/social level: Invite students to locate instances of prejudicial treatment and injustice in modern society.  What are some aspects of modern society where unjust treatment is still an issue? Who is taking purposeful action to combat these injustices? What actions are they taking? Depending on the age of the students and on the time available, this can lead to inquiry projects into the lives of modern day activists and/or the work of social action organizations such as LULAC and the NAACP.
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RECENT ENTRIES
  • The Cat Man of Aleppo
  • Building Zaha
  • Queen of Physics

Teachers as Activists 

If you have two hours…

If you have two days…

If you have two weeks…

Read or reread Soldier for Equality: José de la Luz Sáenz and the Great War and ask students to make note of the meaning that education, language, and reading and writing had in his life. Record students' thoughts on a two column chart with one column labeled ‘claims’ and the second column labeled ‘evidence from the book.’ Next, pair students up, asking students to interview each other about the roles of language and literacy in their lives. Prior to conducting the interviews, brainstorm a list of questions to ask. Questions could include:
  • What languages do you speak? What language are spoken in your family? In your community? What does it mean to you to be bilingual? 
  • Why is education important to you? What do you hope to achieve through education?
  • What do you read and why do you read? What do you hope to learn and/or achieve by reading?
  • What do you write and why do you write? What do you hope to create and/or achieve through writing?
The text set outlined below features the life stories of teachers who also served as activists. Divide students into small groups, each group responsible for reading one of the picturebooks listed below. 
  • Brown, M. (2010). Side by side: the story of Dolores Huerta and Cesar Chavez = Lado a lado: la historia de Dolores Huerta y Cesar Chavez. Ill. by J. Cepeda. Rayo. 
  • Halfmann, J. (2018). Midnight teacher: Lilly Ann Granderson and her secret school. Ill. by L. Ladd. Lee & Low. 
  • Harvey, J.W. (2022). Ablaze with color: A story of painter Alma Thomas. Ill. by Loveis Wise. HarperCollins.
  • Rhuday-Perkovich, O. (2018). Someday is Now: Clara Luper and the 1958 Oklahoma City Sit-ins. Ill. by J. Johnson. Seagrass Press. 
  • Wallace, S.N. & Wallace, R. (2020). The teachers march! How Selma’s teachers changed history. Ill. by C. Palmer. Calkins Creek. 

Provide each group with a graphic organizer on which to record notes about the subject of their biography. Students can record: the name, birth, and death dates of their subject;  where their subject lived and worked; key achievements of their subject; challenges faced by their subject; beliefs about education held by their subject. 

To share their learning about these teacher activists with their classmates, ask each group to create  and perform a monologue in the voice of their subject. The monologue should highlight the information captured in their graphic organizers. 

As an extension of the text set exploration of teacher activists, engage students in a discussion of all the people that serve as teachers in their lives. In which settings do they learn beyond school? Who are the people who mentor, guide, and teach them in all the realms of their lives? Invite students to consider what they could compose, create, or make to honor and celebrate their teachers. Possible projects could include:
  • Interviewing their teachers to create profiles honoring them
  • Developing a forum for community members to publicly thank teachers who have made a meaningful difference in their lives (bulletin board in the school or local public library, social media campaign)
  • Letter writing to thank significant teachers
  • Establishment of a teacher recognition award with student developed award criteria


Citations

Acheson, R. (2020). Research digest: The impact of the covid-19 pandemic on child, adolescent, young adult, and family mental health. Journal of Child Psychotherapy, 46(3), 429-440. https://doi.org/10.1080/0075417X.2021.1912810

Cowie, H., & Myers, C. (2021). The impact of the COVID‐19 pandemic on the mental health and well‐being of children and young people. Children & Society, 35(1), 62-74. https://doi.org/10.1111/chso.12430

Samji, H., Wu, J., Ladak, A., Vossen, C., Stewart, E., Dove, N., Long, D., & Snell, G. (2022). Review: Mental health impacts of the COVID‐19 pandemic on children and youth – a systematic review. Child and Adolescent Mental Health, 27(2), 173-189. https://doi.org/10.1111/camh.12501

Erika Thulin Dawes is a Professor of Language and Literacy at Lesley University where she teaches courses in children’s literature and early childhood literacy and is the program director of the graduate Early Childhood Education program.  Erika is a former chair of NCTE’s Charlotte Huck Award for Outstanding Fiction for Children.

Xenia Hadjioannou is an Associate Professor of Language and Literacy Education at the Harrisburg campus of Penn State University where she teaches and works with pre- and in-service teachers through various courses in language and literacy methodology. She is the Vice President and Website Manager of the Children's Literature Assembly, and a co-editor of The CLA Blog. 

The Bonnie Campbell Hill National Literacy Leader Award
Call for Applications

Do you have a vision for a leadership initiative that stands to improve and enhance literacy teaching and learning ffor students and/or teachers? Consider applying for the 2022 Bonnie Campbell Hill National Literacy Leader Award.
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Exploring the New Frontier of Uncharted Space Stories in Children's Nonfiction

5/10/2022

 

By Suzanne Costner

I headed to Houston in November 2018 to attend the NCTE Annual Convention and moderate a panel presentation for a group of children’s nonfiction writers. I was also looking forward to the Children’s Book Award Luncheon, never realizing that it would change my life. As the presentation of the year’s winners was winding down, an announcement was made encouraging attendees to apply for a place on one of the award committees. My sister nudged me and whispered, “You could do that.” Two months later, I was beginning my term on the Orbis Pictus committee and immersing myself in children’s nonfiction.

From January 2019 through December 2021, we read over 1,300 books on topics ranging from amoebas to world history. As we reviewed, debated, and voted, my favorite topics involved astronomy, aviation, and aerospace, although I enjoyed all of them. The titles that combine those topics with a picture book biography make wonderful entry points into the study of science and history. Even though my time with the Orbis Pictus has ended, I am still searching out those sorts of books to add to my school library collection. I would like to share two of those titles with you and suggest related areas your students might enjoy investigating.
Book cover: Classified: The Secret Career of Mary Gold Ross, Cherokee Aerospace Engineer
Classified: The Secret Career of Mary Gold Ross, Cherokee Aerospace Engineer by Cherokee author Traci Sorell and Métis illustrator Natasha Donovan is an excellent example of a biography that features a woman in a STEM career. The book shows Mary’s love of mathematics and traces her path from teaching, to becoming Lockheed’s first female engineer, and then a member of the Skunk Works division working on satellites and spacecraft. 

Extensive back matter includes a timeline, photos, an author’s note, an explanation of the Cherokee values mentioned in the text, source notes, and a bibliography. Illustrations showcase some of the aircraft Mary worked on such as the Lockheed A-12 and the Starfighter F-104C, as well as equations related to the projects.
To learn more about her amazing career, try the following:
  • Read the Smithsonian article “Mary Golda Ross: Aerospace Engineer, Educator, and Advocate.”
  • Read the Smithsonian article “Mary Golda Ross: She Reached for the Stars.”
  • Watch the Reading Rockets video: “Traci Sorell: Classified: Mary Golda Ross, Cherokee Aerospace Engineer.” 
  • Access the author’s website for additional materials that explore the Cherokee values Mary personified.
  • There is also a Classified Teaching Guide which contains many activity ideas for experimenting with the forces of flight.
Blast Off! How Mary Sherman Morgan Fueled America into Space written by Suzanne Slade and illustrated by Sally Wern Comport is another of the untold stories of the space program. Working with two engineers as her assistants, Mary Sherman Morgan created the rocket fuel hydyne which powered the launch of the first American satellite into space. This biography explores Mary’s late start in school, her determination to pursue a career in chemistry, and her work at North American Aviation.  

This book also has plenty of back matter with photos, a timeline, a selected bibliography, and more details about Mary, the Juno 1 rocket and the Explorer 1 satellite. The author’s note includes an explanation of how difficult it was to find information. She states, “Mary Morgan’s history is not well-documented. Unfortunately, that is true of many women who have made meaningful contributions to science and other fields.” Thanks to the author’s persistence in reaching out to family members, people from Mary’s hometown, and aerospace experts, she was able to create this inspiring story.
Book Cover: Blast Off! How Mary Sherman Morgan Fueled America into Space
Students may find helpful information in the following:
  • The book trailer shows the important launch Mary was working toward with her rocket fuel. 
  • This NASA video tells more about Explorer 1 and its lasting legacy for space exploration. 
  • NASA/Jet Propulsion Laboratory has a web page on Explorer 1 with links to photos, videos, and other information.
  • In this short BBC video George Morgan talks about his mother and Rocket Girl, the book he wrote about her work developing rocket fuel.
  • To make experiments of their own about the perfect fuel ratio for a rocket launch, students might enjoy working with fizzy rockets and trying out different proportions of water to Alka-Seltzer tablets to power the launch. SciTech Labs has posted a how-to video.
  • There is also a lesson plan with instructions available from the Civil Air Patrol.
When I was a child visiting my school library, all the biographies were about famous presidents and other men. We still have a long way to go to balance the representation of women and other marginalized groups, but knowing there are authors and illustrators bringing these stories to life for today’s students is encouraging. Reading these stories of dreams achieved and challenges overcome may inspire young readers to pursue their own passions in life, or even introduce a topic to spark that passion. I hope everyone finds some nonfiction to engage their hearts and minds.
Suzanne Costner, School Library Media Specialist at Fairview Elementary School (Maryville, TN) member of NCTE, CLA, ALA, AASL, ILA, NAEYC, NSTA, ISTE, CAP, AFA, AIAA

#MeetSomeoneNewMonday: One Teacher’s Year-Long Celebration of Picturebook Biographies

5/3/2022

 

By Mary Ann Cappiello, Jennifer M. Graff and Melissa Quimby on behalf of The Biography Clearinghouse

The Biography Clearinghouse Logo
Over the last two years, we’ve enjoyed sharing excerpts from The Biography Clearinghouse website. We hope that our interviews with book creators and our teaching ideas focused on using biographies for a variety of classroom purposes has been helpful to the CLA membership and beyond. This month, we’re very excited to share something different - a voice directly from the classroom.  

Melissa Quimby, a 4th grade teacher in Massachusetts, has written the inaugural entry in our new feature “Stories from the Classroom.” Melissa is the genius behind #MeetSomeoneNewMonday, a weekly initiative that has spread from her classroom to her grade level team to an entirely different school in just three years. 

This initiative launched when Melissa decided to share her passion for picturebook biographies with her students through interactive read-alouds. They were hooked! As Melissa writes, “Over time, I molded this project in intentional ways, and it evolved into an adventure that focused on identity, centered marginalized and minoritized communities, and cultivated thoughtful, strategic middle grade readers.” What started as a way to share nonfiction picturebooks as an engaging and compelling art form developed into a more nuanced exploration of global changemakers–past and present. With their weekly reading of picturebook biographies, students grow as readers and thinkers and deepen their individual and collective sense of agency. 

In the following excerpts, Melissa describes how she reveals each week’s notable changemaker to her students and shares some of her picturebook biography selections.

Monday Read-Aloud Routines

Reveal Slide ExampleReveal Slide Example
On Monday mornings, we gather together as a reading community. In an effort to build excitement, our reveal slide is projected on the board as students arrive. Some weeks, copies of the backmatter wait on the rug, inviting students to preview the figure of the week. This could be the author’s note, a timeline, or a collection of real-life photographs. Once all readers are settled, we watch a video to learn a little bit about the person in the spotlight. 

Some weeks, interactive read aloud time happens on Monday morning immediately following the reveal. On some Mondays, it works best for us to huddle up in the afternoon. Occasionally, we steal pockets of time throughout our busy schedule to enjoy the biography of the week in smaller doses. When we read the text is not as important as how we read the text. The heart of this work truly lies in how we generate emotional investment within our students and how we help our students’ reactions and ideas blossom into new thinking about the world and ways that they can take action in their own lives for themselves and others. Sometimes, we simply read the biography to love it. In those moments, readers are silent with their eyes glued to the book, scanning the illustrations, wide-eyed when something surprising happens. Perhaps they whisper something to their neighbor, let out an audible gasp or share a comment aloud. Sometimes, we read to grow ideas. In these moments, readers are tracking trouble, considering how the figure responds to obstacles. They are ready to turn to their partner and reach for a precise trait word or theme and supporting evidence.

Meet Someone New Monday: A Sampling of Picture Book Biography Selections

Patricia's Vision Cover
Fauja Singh Keeps Going cover
The floating field cover
Between the Lines cover
The Crayon Man cover
The Oldest Student Cover
To read more about #MeetSomeoneNewMonday, including Melissa planning process with her grade level team and student responses, visit Stories from the Classroom on The Biography Clearinghouse website

You can also reach out to Melissa through her website (QUIMBYnotRamona) or Twitter (@QUIMBYnotRamona) to discuss how to implement #MeetSomeoneNew initiative in your classroom or school.

Inspired by Melissa’s picturebook biography initiative or done something similar? Share your ideas and stories with us via email: [email protected]. Or, chime in on Twitter (@teachwithbios), Facebook, or Instagram with your own #teachwithbios ideas and picturebook biography recommendations. 

Melissa Quimby teaches fourth grade in Massachusetts. She is passionate about helping young writers improve their craft, and her to-be-read list is always stacked with middle grade fiction. Melissa shares her love of children’s literature on Teachers Books Readers and shares about her literacy instruction with the Choice Literacy community. You can connect with her at her website, QUIMBYnotRamona, or follow her on Twitter @QUIMBYnotRamona.


Mary Ann Cappiello teaches courses in children’s literature and literacy methods at Lesley University, blogs about teaching with children’s literature at The Classroom Bookshelf. She is a former chair of NCTE’s Orbis Pictus Award for Outstanding Nonfiction K-8.

Jennifer M. Graff is an Associate Professor in the Department of Language and Literacy Education at the University of Georgia where her scholarship focuses on diverse children’s literature and early childhood literacy practices. She is a former committee member of NCTE’s Orbis Pictus Award for Outstanding Nonfiction K-8, and has served in multiple leadership roles throughout her 16+ year CLA membership. 

Women’s History Month

3/1/2022

 

By Julie Waugh and Erika Thulin Dawes on behalf of The Biography Clearinghouse.

Building Zaha cover
March is Women’s History month and picturebook biographies are a powerful way to recognize and celebrate the accomplishments of women. In the most recent Biography Clearinghouse entry,  we explore Victoria Tentler-Krylov’s picture book biography Building Zaha: The Story of Architect Zaha Hadid. As a child, Zaha Hadid was fascinated by aspects of her surroundings that others passed by without observing. Her eye for the beauty in nature developed into a vision for architecture that challenged existing perceptions of what a building could be. In Building Zaha, Victoria Tentler-Krylov describes how these seeds of interest planted in childhood grew into a career and a passionate commitment to an artform. Tentler-Krylov’s water illustrations soar across the page, lifting readers into Zaha’s vision of what humankind’s structures might aspire to be. 

In the Biography Clearinghouse entry for Building Zaha, you will find an interview, in which Victoria Tentler-Krylov describes how her own education as an architect influenced her writing of Zaha Hadid’s story. You’ll find teaching ideas that focus on character development, mentoring, and goal setting, as well as ideas that build content knowledge about the relationship between architecture and nature, the design processes of architecture, and women leaders in the field. Like us, you will be inspired by the lessons that author/ illustrator Victoria Tentler-Krylov learned from studying the life of Zaha Hadid: “Trust your own voice. Trust your own vision.”

Here is an excerpt of the teaching ideas in the Biography Clearinghouse entry for Building Zaha:

Exploring Zaha’s Designs

The World is not a Rectangle Cover
Zaha Hadid became known as “the queen of the curve” in the architecture world.  She created buildings with shapes that people thought impossible to build. Invite students to explore, notice, and wonder with Zaha Hadid’s amazing projects:
  • A Tour of Zaha Hadid’s Most Iconic Buildings from Google Arts and Culture
  • 30 Projects That Define Zaha Hadid’s Style from Rethinking the Future
  • At her death, the BBC created this short video that looks back on Zaha’s work.
  • For a slightly longer look at her life, watch Curious Muse’s Zaha Hadid in 7 Minutes.
  • Google Arts and Culture also has a site Zaha Hadid; Groundbreaking Architect and Visionary.
  • Zaha Hadid’s Architects continues the work of Zaha Hadid.  When she died in 2016 her company had 36 projects underway.  

Another recent children's book biography about Zaha Hadid is The World is Not a Rectangle by Jeanette Winter.  Winter’s book focuses heavily on how Zaha Hadid’s work is influenced by the natural world, whereas Tentler-Krylov’s book focuses more on Zaha the person.  The paired texts could provide a powerful invitation for students to compare and contrast the different ways in which authors made choices about how to share a person’s life in picture book format. 

Breaking Boundaries: Female Architects

Throughout her career, Zaha Hadid encountered stumbling blocks. In the Biography Clearinghouse interview, Victoria Tentler-Krylov describes how her research into Zaha’s life revealed that Zaha wondered how those obstacles related to her identities as a woman and as a Muslim. Women continue to be underrepresented in the field of architecture. After reading Building Zaha, introduce your students to the work of Maya Lin, by reading Maya Lin: Artist-Architect of Light and Lines (written by Jeanne Walker Harvey, illustrated by Dow Phumiruk, Henry Holt, 2017). Compare and contrast the lives, experiences, and accomplishments of these two renowned female architects. Extend your study of women in architecture, by exploring the digital resources below. Connect with a female architect in your community who is willing to share her experiences in the field with your students.
Women of Steel and Stone
ARCHUTE: The 25 Top Female Architects Changing the Architecture Industry


Black Architects on their Challenges, Successes, and Hope for the Future
CULTURED: 15 Architects on Being Black in Architecture 



Early Black Female Architects
MADAME ARCHITECT:  "That [Most] Exceptional One": Early Black Female Architects by Kate Reggev

Designing for Form and Function: Thinking Like an Architect

Victoria Tentler-Krylov shared how one of her favorite illustrations in Building Zaha is the spread where a young Zaha is the only character in a crowded space who is looking up in a beautiful mosque.  Looking closely and wondering can help you think and work like an architect.  Looking closely and wondering can also help you focus on form (what a space looks like) in architecture, and how well that form meets function (what is going to happen in the designed space).  Form and function are ideas that need to work hand in hand for an architect to create a successful place to live or work.

Some people told Zaha Hadid that form was more important to her than function.  She was criticized that her creative, uniquely designed spaces did not use space as well as they could, or did not use space as efficiently as possible.  This was  part of why, early in her career, people told Zaha that she would only be a “paper architect” - an architect that would only have designs on paper and not made into buildings.
If you have 1-2 hours…

If you have 1-2 days…

If you have 1-2 weeks…

Invite students to look closely at your own classroom. What do you notice about how it is formed?  How well does the way it is designed help you learn?  How could you improve your classroom’s design to make it a better place to learn? Record some ideas and make some initial sketches. 
Zaha Hadid started many of her earlier architectural plans with paint and brush. After sharing ideas about how the classroom could be improved and redesigned, invite students to use different media to create initial plans for a newly designed classroom, much the same way that she did.  You may wish to share some of Zaha’s initial architectural artwork to inspire them.

Zaha Hadid was one of the first people to predict that computers would transform the architectural design process.  It is possible that computers allowed her to create some of the unique shapes and structures that many thought were not possible. Collaborate with a local architect who can demonstrate their use of computer programs in their process of design. Visit with the architect in person or by Zoom so that students can see the architect's sketches and final plans. Ask questions about how the architect considers form and function in their design.

Discuss how plans become blueprints that serve as guides for the construction of a building. Invite your students to revisit the initial classroom design plans they created with an eye for the relationship between form and function. How does the structure of the classroom they have created relate to its proposed use? Pair students so that they can describe their classroom plans to a classmate to get feedback. Next, ask students to create a more blueprint-like sketch of their envisioned classroom. 

Some students may be up for the challenge to use Google Sketch Up to create a structure from its creative beginnings to a model that you can walk through virtually.   

Additional Resources:

The Guggenheim Museum in New York has a repository interesting resources for teachers, with lesson plans, entitled Form Follows Function.

Sebastian, S., Shankar, R. & Al Qeisi, S. (2018). Design approach of Zaha Hadid from vocabularies and design techniques. Journal of Emerging Technologies and Innovative Research. 5 (6), 495-503.

Other Recently Featured Biographies

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  • Queen of Physics: How Wu Chien Shiung Helped Unlock the Secrets of the Atom
  • Sharuko: ​El Arqueólogo Peruano/ Peruvian Archaeologist
  • Eleanor Makes her Mark: How Eleanor Roosevelt Reached Out, Spoke up, and Changed the World
Erika Thulin Dawes is Professor of Language and Literacy at Lesley University  where she teaches courses in children’s literature and early childhood literacy. She blogs about teaching with children’s literature at The Classroom Bookshelf, a School Library Journal blog, and is a former chair of NCTE’s Charlotte Huck Award for Outstanding Fiction for Children.

Julie Waugh
teaches 8th grade ELA at Smith Junior High and serves as an Inquiry Coach for Mesa Public Schools.  She delights in the company of children surrounded and inspired by books. A longtime member of NCTE, and an enthusiastic newer member of CLA, Julie is a former committee member of NCTE's Orbis Pictus Award for Outstanding Nonfiction for Children.
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