Freedom Summer

I read freedom summer by Deborah Wiles. This book didn't receive any major awards. This book is so sweet! It's from the point of view of a little white boy named Joe whose best friend is a little black boy named John Henry. There are things Joe can do that John Henry can't like swimming in the public pool, but that doesn't stop them from being best friends. They even built a dam in a creek to create their own swimming spot. However, there comes a day where the rules of separation are now gone, and John Henry and Joe could do things together now. The first thing they wanted to do together was go swimming in the public pool, but when they got there it was being filled with black tar. This made John Henry angry, so Joe had the idea of going to the general store to get ice cream, and that's exactly what they did, together. This is a very heart-felt book, and I love the truth it reveals about kids who were living in this time period. I think the appropriate grade level for this book would be first grade to eighth grade. A way I would incorporate this book in my future classroom would be when going over the topic of slavery, and I think this job does a great job of showing the truth in that time period through the eyes of children. I think a great activity would be for each student to write about how it would make them feel if they were in John Henry's shoes.

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