An Educator’s Guide to Separate Is Never Equal: Sylvia Mendez & Her Family’s Fight for Desegregation EDUCATOR’S GUIDE PRODUCED BY THE CONSORTIUM FOR LATIN AMERICAN STUDIES PROGRAMS WRITTEN BY KATRINA DILLON An Educator’s Guide to Separate Is Never Equal: Sylvia Mendez & Her Family’s Fight for Desegregation ACKNOWLEDGMENTS ABOUT THIS GUIDE This educator’s guide was written to support using Separate is Never Equal: Sylvia Mendez & Her Family’s Fight for Desegregation in elementary and middle school classrooms. Produced by the Consortium of Latin American Studies Programs (CLASP) on behalf of the Américas Award, it was written in 2015 by Katrina Dillon, a project assistant at the University of New Mexico. Editorial support was also provided by UNM graduate assistant Alice Donahue. ABOUT THE AMÉRICAS AWARD CLASP founded the Américas Award in 1993 to encourage and commend authors, illustrators and publish- ers who produce quality children’s and young adult books that portray Latin America, the Caribbean, or Latinos in the United States, and to provide teachers with recommendations for classroom use. CLASP offers up to two annual book awards, together with a commended list of titles. For more information con- cerning the Américas Award, including additional classroom resources, please visit the CLASP website. The awards are administered by CLASP and coordinated by both Tulane University’s Stone Center for Latin American Studies and Vanderbilt University’s Center for Latin American Studies. Generous support is also provided by Florida International University, Stanford University, The Ohio State University, University of Florida, University of New Mexico, University of Utah, and the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee. ABOUT CLASP CLASP’s mission is to promote all facets of Latin American studies throughout the world. Its broad range of activities include the encouragement of research activities, funding of professional workshops, advancement of citizen outreach activities, and development of teaching aids for the classroom. 2 An Educator’s Guide to Separate Is Never Equal: Sylvia Mendez & Her Family’s Fight for Desegregation TABLE OF CONTENTS Overview ............................................................................................................................. 4 Applicable Common Core State Standards .......................................................................... 6 About Author and Illustrator Duncan Tonatiuh ..................................................................... 7 Author’s Note ...................................................................................................................... 7 Classroom Relevance and Applications ............................................................................... 9 Lesson Plans and Activities ................................................................................................. 11 Vocabulary ............................................................................................................... 11 Activity I: Vocabulary Study (Cognitive Content Dictionary) ....................................... 11 Activity 2: Sentence Illustration: The Importance of Prefixes ..................................... 12 Pre-Reading Activities ............................................................................................... 13 Activity 1: Observation Charts ........................................................................ 13 Activity 2: Picture Walk ................................................................................... 14 Activity 3: Non-Fiction Genre Study................................................................. 14 Activity 4: Think, Pair, Share: Equality, Segregation, Justice ............................ 15 Guided Reading Questions ........................................................................................ 16 Post-Reading Activities ............................................................................................. 20 Activity 1: Comprehension Check ................................................................... 20 Activity 2: Dear Sylvia ..................................................................................... 20 Activity 3: Acrostic Poetry ............................................................................... 21 Activity 4: Persuasive Writing .......................................................................... 21 Multimedia Resources ......................................................................................................... 23 Featured Lesson Plans and Resources ................................................................................ 24 Complementary Literature ................................................................................................... 25 Appendix ............................................................................................................................. 35 Images from the Book ............................................................................................... 36 3 An Educator’s Guide to Separate Is Never Equal: Sylvia Mendez & Her Family’s Fight for Desegregation OVERVIEW Separate is Never Equal: Sylvia Mendez & Her Family’s Fight for Desegregation Written and illustrated by Duncan Tonatiuh Published 2015 by Abrams Books for Young Readers ISBN 1-4197-1054-0 THEMES Segregation, Inequality, Injustice, Civil Rights Movement, Activism, Human Rights, Legal System, U.S. History, Latino History in the United States, Education, Family, Community SYNOPSIS Almost 10 years before Brown vs. Board of Education, Sylvia Mendez and her parents helped end school segregation in California. An American citizen of Mexican and Puerto Rican heritage who spoke and wrote perfect English, Mendez was denied enrollment to a “Whites only” school. Her parents took action by organizing the Hispanic community and filing a lawsuit in federal district court. Their success eventually brought an end to the era of segregated education in California. View the book trailer for Separate is Never Equal: Sylvia Mendez & Her Family’s Fight for Desegregation produced by the Texas Bluebonnet Award. READING LEVEL Grades 1-5 / Ages 7-12 REVIEWS “Tonatiuh masterfully combines text and folk-inspired art to add an important piece to the mosaic of U.S. civil rights history.” —Kirkus Reviews, starred review 4 An Educator’s Guide to Separate Is Never Equal: Sylvia Mendez & Her Family’s Fight for Desegregation “Children will understand the importance of the 1947 ruling that desegregated California schools, paving the way for Brown v. Board of Education seven years later” —School Library Journal “Tonatiuh (Pancho Rabbit and the Coyote) offers an illuminating account of a family’s hard-fought legal battle to desegregate California schools in the years before Brown v. Board of Education.” —Publishers Weekly “Pura Belpré Award–winning Tonatiuh makes excellent use of picture-book storytelling to bring attention to the 1947 California ruling against public-school segregation.” —Booklist “The straightforward narrative is well matched with the illustrations in Tonatiuh’s signature style, their two-dimensional perspective reminiscent of the Mixtec codex but collaged with paper, wood, cloth, brick, and (Photoshopped) hair to provide textural variation. This story deserves to be more widely known, and now, thanks to this book, it will be.” —The Horn Book Magazine AWARDS • Américas Award Winner 2015 • Pura Belpré Award, Honor, Illustrator 2015 • Tomás Rivera Mexican American Children’s Book Award 2015 • IRA Notable Books for a Global Society Winner 2015 • NCTE Orbis Pictus Honor Book 2015 • Robert F. Sibert Medal, Honor Book 2015 • ALA Notable Books for Children, Middle Readers 2015 • Jane Addams Award Winner, Young Readers 2015 • SLJ Best Books, Nonfiction 2014 • Kirkus Reviews Best Books of 2014, Picture Books • Center for the Study of Multicultural Children’s Literature, Best Multicultural Books of 2014 • New York Public Library, 100 Titles for Reading and Sharing, Nonfiction 2014 • Cybils Awards Finalist, Nonfiction for Elementary & Middle Grades 2014 5 An Educator’s Guide to Separate Is Never Equal: Sylvia Mendez & Her Family’s Fight for Desegregation APPLICABLE COMMON CORE STATE STANDARDS K-12 READING Key Ideas and Details • Read closely to determine what the text says explicitly and to make logical inferences from it; cite specific textual evidence when writing or speaking to support conclusions drawn from the text. • Determine central ideas or themes of a text and analyze their development; summarize the key supporting details and ideas. • Analyze how and why individuals, events, and ideas develop and interact over the course of a text. Craft and Structure • Interpret words and phrases as they are used in a text, including determining technical, connotative, and figurative meanings, and analyze how specific word choices shape meaning or tone. • Analyze the structure of texts, including how specific sentences, paragraphs, and larger portions of the text (e.g., a section, chapter, scene, or stanza) relate to each other and the whole. • Assess how point of view or purpose shapes the content and style of a text. Range of Reading and Level of Text Complexity • Read and comprehend complex literary and informational texts independently and proficiently. Integration of Knowledge and Ideas • Integrate and evaluate content presented in diverse media and formats, including visually and quantitative- ly, as well as in words. K-12 WRITING