Diverse Learners Text Set: Religion K-2
Summary of Text:
Come With Me is the story of a young girl who wants to make a positive difference in a world that has fear and hatred. She asks her parents what she can do, and they show her the importance of kindness and spreading love to others. Love conquers fear, hate, and anger. Showing others kindness and joy can ripple effect and change the world.
Critical Review:
Strengths: A strength of this book is the way the author told the story through the lens of a young girl. She may seem small, but she is mighty and capable of making a difference. This is a great story for young children who need to learn the importance of virtues and the impact they can have on the world around them. Virtues are often associated with religion, and can be recognized as being similar across many different religions. Teaching students about virtues is a great way to incorporate the aspect of religion, without it being the direct concept.
Weaknesses: A weakness of this book is the lack of information about the young girl. If students knew more about her, they may be able to see themselves in her character and desire to follow her behavior. However, she remains to be a fairly simple character and doesn't reveal deep characteristics. The book could even be longer and provide a greater variety of acts of kindness of children who maybe cannot travel like she is able to. These acts of kindness could consist of classroom examples so the students can apply their new knowledge right away in the classroom, and develop a strong and kind learning community.
The author's perspective seems to connect through the desire to spread joy and kindness to the world. She appears to be a writer passionate about children seeing the world in a positive light and making a change.
The illustrations reveal authentic characters that keep from fully identifying anyone. The young girl and her father are lighter than her mother, however her mother's race is never identified. They travel to the market and there are individuals with head wraps and dark skin, and are not referred to in the text. The illustrations are not exaggerated or drawn out of proportion, the characters are simply not identified as being any specific race or ethnicity.
The main character is a young white girl who desires to make the world a better place. She watches the news and becomes afraid of what is happening in the world. The news is never specified, but with her race being white, it is possible to assume that she is afraid of something she doesn't know, such as another race. This possibly makes her a majority character, desiring to decrease the harm inflicted by a minority character. However, this is never specified and is a falsifiable statement.
The author does a wonderful job of connecting people through small acts of kindness. The young girl rides the train with her dad and tips her hat to a stranger, connecting her to those strangers. She also goes to the market and interacts with strangers, connecting herself to them through shopping for produce. These diverse characters are brought together through daily acts supplemented with acts of kindness.
Classroom Connections:
Main Themes: The main theme of this text is that kindness can be anything from waving at someone, to drawing chalk on the sidewalk. All it takes is inviting someone to join your movement and spreading thoughtfulness to those around you.
Possible Activities: An activity the students could participate in after reading this book would be to write a letter to someone in their class that they admire and have kind words for. As the teacher, I would randomly select which student is paired with who, in order to prevent students from being left out. Every student would write a kind letter to their peer and give it to them. This would help them with letter structure, as well as the practice of a random act of kindness.
Additional Resources:
1. https://www.themaven.net/kidsactivities/kidsactivities/55-kindness-activities-for-kids-Sllo2G4stU2YcchToWghUg?full=1
The link above is a website with plenty of classroom and at home ideas of acts of kindness.
2. https://theinspiredclassroom.com/2013/02/get-creative-with-kindness-4-activities-for-the-classroom/
The link above takes you to a website full of ideas for spreading kindness in your classroom. Some of the ideas include a kindness chain, kindness circle, and kindness cards.
3. https://mbfchildsafetymatters.org/wp-content/uploads/2017/09/Bullying-Prevention-Lesson-Plan_K-2_Oct2017.pdf
The link above takes you to a PDF full of lesson plans and standards that teach students the importance of bully prevention and the ways each person can make a difference by spreading kindness and joy to others.
Come With Me is the story of a young girl who wants to make a positive difference in a world that has fear and hatred. She asks her parents what she can do, and they show her the importance of kindness and spreading love to others. Love conquers fear, hate, and anger. Showing others kindness and joy can ripple effect and change the world.
Critical Review:
Strengths: A strength of this book is the way the author told the story through the lens of a young girl. She may seem small, but she is mighty and capable of making a difference. This is a great story for young children who need to learn the importance of virtues and the impact they can have on the world around them. Virtues are often associated with religion, and can be recognized as being similar across many different religions. Teaching students about virtues is a great way to incorporate the aspect of religion, without it being the direct concept.
Weaknesses: A weakness of this book is the lack of information about the young girl. If students knew more about her, they may be able to see themselves in her character and desire to follow her behavior. However, she remains to be a fairly simple character and doesn't reveal deep characteristics. The book could even be longer and provide a greater variety of acts of kindness of children who maybe cannot travel like she is able to. These acts of kindness could consist of classroom examples so the students can apply their new knowledge right away in the classroom, and develop a strong and kind learning community.
The author's perspective seems to connect through the desire to spread joy and kindness to the world. She appears to be a writer passionate about children seeing the world in a positive light and making a change.
The illustrations reveal authentic characters that keep from fully identifying anyone. The young girl and her father are lighter than her mother, however her mother's race is never identified. They travel to the market and there are individuals with head wraps and dark skin, and are not referred to in the text. The illustrations are not exaggerated or drawn out of proportion, the characters are simply not identified as being any specific race or ethnicity.
The main character is a young white girl who desires to make the world a better place. She watches the news and becomes afraid of what is happening in the world. The news is never specified, but with her race being white, it is possible to assume that she is afraid of something she doesn't know, such as another race. This possibly makes her a majority character, desiring to decrease the harm inflicted by a minority character. However, this is never specified and is a falsifiable statement.
The author does a wonderful job of connecting people through small acts of kindness. The young girl rides the train with her dad and tips her hat to a stranger, connecting her to those strangers. She also goes to the market and interacts with strangers, connecting herself to them through shopping for produce. These diverse characters are brought together through daily acts supplemented with acts of kindness.
Classroom Connections:
Main Themes: The main theme of this text is that kindness can be anything from waving at someone, to drawing chalk on the sidewalk. All it takes is inviting someone to join your movement and spreading thoughtfulness to those around you.
Possible Activities: An activity the students could participate in after reading this book would be to write a letter to someone in their class that they admire and have kind words for. As the teacher, I would randomly select which student is paired with who, in order to prevent students from being left out. Every student would write a kind letter to their peer and give it to them. This would help them with letter structure, as well as the practice of a random act of kindness.
Additional Resources:
1. https://www.themaven.net/kidsactivities/kidsactivities/55-kindness-activities-for-kids-Sllo2G4stU2YcchToWghUg?full=1
The link above is a website with plenty of classroom and at home ideas of acts of kindness.
2. https://theinspiredclassroom.com/2013/02/get-creative-with-kindness-4-activities-for-the-classroom/
The link above takes you to a website full of ideas for spreading kindness in your classroom. Some of the ideas include a kindness chain, kindness circle, and kindness cards.
3. https://mbfchildsafetymatters.org/wp-content/uploads/2017/09/Bullying-Prevention-Lesson-Plan_K-2_Oct2017.pdf
The link above takes you to a PDF full of lesson plans and standards that teach students the importance of bully prevention and the ways each person can make a difference by spreading kindness and joy to others.