Help me give my students copies of classic texts by Toni Morrison (The Source of Self-Regard) and James Baldwin (The Fire Next Time), two brilliant American intellectuals to whom all high school students should be exposed.
FULLY FUNDED! Mr. Jones's classroom raised $748
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My Students
My students come from all neighborhoods of our city in New York, and their backgrounds range a great deal with regard to race/ethnicity, socioeconomic status, and life experience.
Our school encourages students to become advocates in their own learning, and they are given a great deal of choice in the direction of their studies.
They are taught to imagine, innovate, inquire, and investigate.
When our students graduate, they are prepared to attend college and the world beyond, equipped with 21st-century critical thinking skills and technological savvy.
My Project
Students in my AP Language and Composition course need a break from screens. While we've used digital versions of essays written by both Toni Morrison and James Baldwin in the past, I find it important to get back to some fundamental basics in the post-COVID era classroom. I have requested a class set of both The Source of Self-Regard by Toni Morrison and The Fire Next Time by James Baldwin. I want students to be able to handle actual copies of each of these books, slowing the reading down a bit so that they can fully absorb each writer's ideas and be reintroduced to the tactile experience of turning pages and gripping a spine.
This past year, of everything I assigned while teaching remotely, the work of Toni Morrison and James Baldwin had the most significant impact on how my students thought, what they were inspired to write, and how ambitious their risk-taking was when it came to stylistic choices.
Consequently, I want to double-down on my efforts to incorporate the writing of each of them into my curriculum. In this time of social upheaval and fragile progress, I can't think of a more suitable pairing of American voices to amplify.
In her eulogy of Baldwin, Morrison told her audience that Baldwin had bestowed upon her three gifts: language, courage, and tenderness. With your assistance, I will strive to bestow these same gifts to my students through their work.
More than half of students from low‑income households
Data about students' economic need comes from the National Center for Education Statistics, via our partners at MDR Education. Learn more
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