I am so thrilled to be making a book with Angus Yuen-Killick, founder of Red Comet Press. The incredibly talented Keith Henry Brown will illustrate Postcards from Malcolm X: How Yuri Kochiyama Became a Civil Rights Activist. This middle grade picture book biography is slated to come out in 2024! p.s. Related posts: Highlights…
Category: Social Studies
History, social science and geography for kids.
I Walk the Black Heritage Trail in Boston
I’ve wanted to do the Black Heritage Trail in Boston’s Beacon Hill since I moved here but it’s a lot harder to find than the Freedom Trail which is marked by a red brick line that traverses the city. I thought the Black Heritage Trail started somewhere in Boston and extended to the South End…
Raksha Bandhan with India’s Boxing Champion Vaibhav Yadav
I learned about Raksha Bandhan from Rajani LaRocca’s Storytelling Math picture book, Bracelets for Bina’s Brothers. We used her picture book for the August 2021 Multicultural Children’s Book Club. I also learned about Raksha Bandhan from my friend, Vaibhav Yadav, who trained at my boxing gym. He’s India’s Unified Welterweight boxing champion, a.k.a….
New Orleans Holocaust Memorial
The New Orleans Holocaust Memorial Sculpture is an artistic visual prayer in memory of the Six Million Jews of Europe and those millions of other victims who were tortured and murdered by the Nazis and their collaborators from 1933-1945. The sculpture is composed of nine panels, each with different designs. As you view the scupture…
Celebrating Girls’ Day: A Japanese Holiday called Hinamatsuri
I’m half Japanese American but I’ve never celebrated Hinamatsuri, known as Girls’ Day or Doll’s Day, in Japan. It is celebrated on March 3 every year with a display of dolls representing the Heian court in a celebration to celebrate girls and wish for their continued good health and happiness. An expansive hinadan in Katsuura,…
Andrew Jackson Murdered His Native American General: Things They Don’t Teach You in History Books
“If the plantation owners of the South, Jackson’s people, were to have the land they wanted to grow more cotton, the Choctaws had to move,” I said. “And if you, Chief Pushmataha, were so against this move, you must be gone, out of the way.” from When A Ghost Talks, Listen by Tim Tingle …
When Mixed Race Marriage Was Illegal: What They Don’t Teach in History Books
2017 marks the 50th anniversary of the landmark case that made mixed-race marriages legal. It’s hard to imagine that mixed-race marriages were illegal until quite recently. What is the outcome of making mixed-race marriages legal? Anti-miscegenation laws or miscegenation laws are laws that enforce racial segregation at the level of marriage and intimate relationships by…