Boycott Blues How Rosa Parks Inspired a Nation

Genre: Nonfiction
Author: Andrea Davis Pinkney

Summary: Boycott Blues tells the story of the Montgomery Bus Boycott of 1955/56, starting off with the story of Rosa Parks and her refusal to give up her seat to a white man after a long day at work as a seamstress. The story continues as blacks refuse to ride the bus and instead begin to walk everywhere for 300+ days in all types of weather. Boycott Blues is told in a fashion that seems more like an old woman talking or perhaps someone singing a blues song, as the title represents. Readers follow the story of the boycott until over a year passes and the segregation ends, allowing blacks to sit where ever they want on the buses.

Lesson: I'm not sure if I totally love this book. I like how it gives information of the Montgomery Bus Boycott in a song/storyteller fashion and I feel like children will be interested in the story as it is read to them. I'm just a little unsure about making Jim Crows law into a symbol of a crow pecking people throughout the book. If I was to use this book, it would have to go along with another book on the bus boycott. After reading this book I would get students to start discussing what they thought about he book, such as if the Jim Crow laws were actually crows along with how they feel about blacks not getting equality on the buses.