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Freedom on the Menu: The Greensboro Sit-Ins

Social Studies

Geography – North Carolina
This story takes place in Greensboro, North Carolina.  Locate Greensboro, NC on your map.  What states border North Carolina?  What ocean borders North Carolina?

North Carolina, also known as the Tarheel State, was the 12th state to join the United States of America; it became a state on November 21, 1789.  The capital is Raleigh (locate on your map) which was named after Sir Walter Raleigh who founded two colonies on the coast in the late 1580s.   The major industries in North Carolina are farming (tobacco as well as poultry), textiles, and furniture. 

North Carolina was a slave state at the time of the Civil War.  Slaves were very important to help work the tobacco fields of many plantation owners.  About 1/3 of the population of North Carolina owned slaves.  

Geography rabbit trail:  Connie’s aunt is from New York.  Can you find New York on the map?  Map a route from New York to Greensboro.  How many miles between North Carolina and New York?

History – Jim Crow Laws
The Jim Crow laws were laws enacted primarily in the Southern and border states of the United States between 1876 and 1965. They mandated "separate but equal" status for black Americans resulting in treatment and accommodations that were inferior to those provided to whites. They required that public schools, public places and public transportation, like trains and buses, have separate facilities for whites and blacks.

Discuss with your child some feelings the blacks may have felt during that time.  Is separate really equal?  Look at the picture of the drinking fountains.  Notice that the one labeled “white” looks clean and the one labeled “colored” looks dirty.  Is it appropriate to call someone "colored?"  Why not?

History – 1960’s sit-ins
On Feb.1, 1960, four African American students from North Carolina Agricultural and Technical College sat at the counter at Woolworth’s lunch counter.  They were refused lunch, but were allowed to continue sitting there.  It caused Woolworth’s to close early because the whites did not want to sit and have lunch next to the coloreds.  This led to sit-ins in other cities and states across the south.  By July 1960, Woolworth’s served the coloreds at the lunch counter for the first time.  Discuss discrimination, the unfair treatment of a person because of unreasonable feelings or opinions.  Do you see examples of discrimination in your town or neighborhood?  (Think about religious beliefs, appearance, etc. rather than just blacks.)

History – Civil Rights Movement
The Civil Rights Movement’s goal was to demolish racial discrimination against African Americans, between 1954 to 1968, in the southern United States.  Martin Luther King Jr. was one of the top leaders of the Civil Rights Movement. The movement succeeded in giving blacks equal rights through the sit-ins, boycotts and protests.  The start of the Civil Rights Movement was the Montgomery Bus Boycott in Montgomery, Alabama when Rosa Parks refused to give up her seat on a bus to a white man.  At that time, blacks refused to ride on the busses, starting the boycott.  Read a book about Rosa Parks.  (A Picture Book of Rosa Parks by David A. Adler is a very good choice.) 

History – Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.
Martin Luther King, Jr. was one of the main leaders of the American civil rights movement. A Baptist minister by training, King became a civil rights activist early in his career, leading the Montgomery Bus Boycott.  King delivered his “I Have a Dream” speech in Washington in 1963.  Dr. King was assassinated on April 4, 1968, in Memphis, Tennessee.  Read part of the “I Have a Dream” speech:

 “I have a dream today… that one day… little black boys and black girls will be able to join hands with little white boys and white girls as sisters and brothers.  I have a dream today.”  “I have a dream that my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin but by the content of their character.”

Did Martin Luther King, Jr.’ dream come true?  Before or after he died? 

Language Arts

Vocabulary
Swivel - to turn as if on a swivel
Jutted - To extend outward
Protest - a declaration of disapproval
Picket - to engage in a demonstration against a government's policies or actions
Arrested - To seize and hold under the authority of law
Stubborn- fixed or set in purpose or opinion
Chanting- A monotonous rhythmic call or shout
Jolted - To cause to move jerkily

Copywork Ideas
Let your student copy a passage from Dr. King's famous "I Have a Dream" speech.

“I have a dream that one day this nation will rise up and live out the true meaning of its creed: 'We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal.'"

"Let freedom ring. And when this happens, and when we allow freedom ring—when we let it ring from every village and every hamlet, from every state and every city, we will be able to speed up that day when all of God's children—black men and white men, Jews and Gentiles, Protestants and Catholics—will be able to join hands and sing in the words of the old Negro spiritual: 'Free at last! Free at last! Thank God Almighty, we are free at last!'"?

Poem  for Discussion

Merry-Go-Round by Langston Hughes

COLORED CHILD AT CARNIVAL

Where is the Jim Crow section
On this merry-go-round,
Mister, cause I want to ride?
Down South where I come from
White and colored
Can't sit side by side.
Down South on the train
There's a Jim Crow car.
On the bus we're put in the back--
But there ain't no back
To a merry-go-round!
Where's the horse
For a kid that's black?

Science

Bananas
Banana plants are grown in tropical areas that are hot and humid on plantations; they are not trees – they do not have a woody trunk like trees do.  Banana plants can grow up to 30 feet tall in one year!    Leaves as long as 12 feet spiral up from the ground wrapping around each other to make the stem sturdy.  One banana plant can produce as many as fifteen hands of bananas forming a bunch that can weigh more than 100 pounds.  Each hand of bananas contain 10-20 bananas, called fingers.  Bananas are cut from the stalk while they are still unripe and left to ripen off the plant.

Some animals that eat bananas are the macaw (a long-tailed, colorful parrot) and the owl butterfly, both from Central and South American rain forests. Chimpanzees from Africa also eat bananas.

Bananas are high on potassium which our bodies need to keep muscles strong.  They also contain tryptophan, an amino acid that is thought to make people sleepy. 

How can you tell when bananas are ripe?  A yellow banana flecked with brown spots is ripe.  If the banana is green, it is not yet ripe.

Experiment- Ripening Bananas

Materials: two green bananas and a paper or plastic bag

Procedure:
1.  Put one banana on the kitchen counter, and place the other banana in a paper or plastic bag with a few small holes poked in it.
2.  Write down the color of each banana every morning for 3 days, such as “half green,” “all yellow,” or one-quarter black.”
3.  Which banana ripened (and turned black) quicker?

What happened?  The banana in the paper or plastic bag ripens faster because the banana produces an ethylene gas which gets trapped in the bag; this gas speeds up the ripening process.

Just for Fun:  Banana Jokes!

What does the banana do when it sees a gorilla?  The banana splits!

Why do bananas use suntan lotion?  Because they peel.

What do you get when you cross a couple of bananas?  A pair of slippers

Science (and Langauage Arts ~ Expressions) – Mules
Mama called sister “mule-stubborn.”  What does that mean?  “Stubborn as a mule” comes from a phrase used for the mules that were used to plow the clay soil in Missouri. 

A mule is the offspring of a male donkey and a female horse.  Mules have short, thick heads, long ears, and a short mane.  Overall, the mule looks like a donkey with the exception of its size and teeth, which both resemble the horse.

Berlioz the Bear is a good example of a story that shows the stubbornness of a mule!

Math

Ordering From a Catalog
Give your child a catalog (that includes toys, books, or clothing).  What can your child "buy" for $100?  Can he buy an entire outfit including shoes?  How much is left over?  Remember to teach your child about sales tax and shipping costs.

Money
The store in the book is called a "Five-and-Dime Store."  Is your student familiar with money?  What does the five in the title stand for?  (a nickel!)  Review your 5 and 10 facts or practice counting by 5s and 10s.  Use nickels and dimes for manipulatives, if desired.

Art

Signs
Look at the signs in the book.  Create a slogan and make a sign for something you believe in.  Hang it up somewhere where people can see it.

Field Trip Idea

Newspaper Printer
How are newspapers printed?  Who writes the articles?  How do they know when there is a story to write? 

To learn more about newspapers and the printing process, check out Deadline!: From News to Newspaper by Gail Gibbons and read it together.