Dear Teachers,
My name is Margaret Gallina and I created this online resource about the book A Boy Named Beckoning. I am in a class at Ball State University during Fall 2013 called “Rethinking Children’s Literature,” where we have been reading and discussing books about social justice issue.
For my final project, I decided to focus on Native American literature. When Native Americans are taught in school, it is generally in the context of history. Either students are learning about pre-Colonial America, or they are doing a topical unit about Thanksgiving. Unfortunately, the way we teach about Native Americans often perpetuates harmful stereotypes.
One way to combat these stereotypes is to teach students about Native Americans in a purposeful way, outside of history class and Thanksgiving. In addition, when we teach about Native Americans, we should encourage student’s critical thinking skills and have them consider the images and stereotypes of Native Americans they have in their subconscious.
In order to achieve that goal, I have created a unit plan based on the book A Boy Named Beckoning: The True Story of Dr. Carlos Montezuma, Native American Hero, by Gina Capaldi. I chose this book because it is a book that is both of the highest quality and which meets suggested guidelines for quality books about Native Americans. For more information on the suggested guidelines, please visit the page “Assessing Native American Books” in the “For Educators” section of the website.
The unit plan includes a student introduction letter and book trailer and classroom activities based on Bloom’s Taxonomy. “Student-friendly” version of the assignment can be found in the “Activities” section of this website, while more thorough explanations and recommended assessments are found in the “For Educators” section. The goal for the unit is for students to be able to answer the question: What does Dr. Carlos Montezuma teach us about the experiences of Native Americans? The unit with a pre-activity to get students thinking about Native American issues, then begins a series of tasks helping students to think critically about Dr. Montezuma's life and about the lives of Native Americans in general. The goal is for students to be able to answer the question, what does Dr. Carlos Montezuma teach us about the experiences of Native Americans? The last activity (Bloom's 6: Creating) asks students to make a product like a poster, powerpoint, or online presntation that works to inform people about Native American stereotypes that they have learned to be inaccurate, as well as advocate to someone else that they should read this book.
This book is non-fiction, and therefore can be used to meet Common Core standards as an informational text. Scholastic rates its reading level as 4.7. Although it’s always important to be critical of published reading levels and use them judiciously, I have used this recommendation to align the activities to fourth grade Common Core English standards.
I hope that you will use this book in your classroom. It’s a beautiful story about the courage of the human spirit, and the ability for all people to use their experiences to change the world.
Sincerely,
Margaret Gallina
For my final project, I decided to focus on Native American literature. When Native Americans are taught in school, it is generally in the context of history. Either students are learning about pre-Colonial America, or they are doing a topical unit about Thanksgiving. Unfortunately, the way we teach about Native Americans often perpetuates harmful stereotypes.
One way to combat these stereotypes is to teach students about Native Americans in a purposeful way, outside of history class and Thanksgiving. In addition, when we teach about Native Americans, we should encourage student’s critical thinking skills and have them consider the images and stereotypes of Native Americans they have in their subconscious.
In order to achieve that goal, I have created a unit plan based on the book A Boy Named Beckoning: The True Story of Dr. Carlos Montezuma, Native American Hero, by Gina Capaldi. I chose this book because it is a book that is both of the highest quality and which meets suggested guidelines for quality books about Native Americans. For more information on the suggested guidelines, please visit the page “Assessing Native American Books” in the “For Educators” section of the website.
The unit plan includes a student introduction letter and book trailer and classroom activities based on Bloom’s Taxonomy. “Student-friendly” version of the assignment can be found in the “Activities” section of this website, while more thorough explanations and recommended assessments are found in the “For Educators” section. The goal for the unit is for students to be able to answer the question: What does Dr. Carlos Montezuma teach us about the experiences of Native Americans? The unit with a pre-activity to get students thinking about Native American issues, then begins a series of tasks helping students to think critically about Dr. Montezuma's life and about the lives of Native Americans in general. The goal is for students to be able to answer the question, what does Dr. Carlos Montezuma teach us about the experiences of Native Americans? The last activity (Bloom's 6: Creating) asks students to make a product like a poster, powerpoint, or online presntation that works to inform people about Native American stereotypes that they have learned to be inaccurate, as well as advocate to someone else that they should read this book.
This book is non-fiction, and therefore can be used to meet Common Core standards as an informational text. Scholastic rates its reading level as 4.7. Although it’s always important to be critical of published reading levels and use them judiciously, I have used this recommendation to align the activities to fourth grade Common Core English standards.
I hope that you will use this book in your classroom. It’s a beautiful story about the courage of the human spirit, and the ability for all people to use their experiences to change the world.
Sincerely,
Margaret Gallina