Through My Eyes by Ruby Bridges

Title: Through My Eyes
Author/Compiler & Editor: Ruby Bridges/ Margo Lundell
Genre: Non-fiction; Autobiography
Major Awards: Jane Addams Children's Book Awards; Carter C. Woodson Book Award
Age: 8-12

This book is about Ruby Bridges life and how she changed a world's view and was the first child to be integrated into an all-white school system. In the beginning pages of this book w get a background of her early life and all the things she's experienced so far, and how when they were considering children to be integrated they had to take this test and how it was made to be super hard, because they figured if none of the black children passed the test they wouldn't have to integrate that school year, but Ruby and a few others passed that test and were set to be integrated. At first her father was unsure because he fought in the Korean War and knows how segregation can affect them, but ultimately it was her mother who convinced him that they should do it. As she left her first day of school she remembers seeing a black doll in a coffin in one of the protestors hands and that really frightened her. When she got to class there was no one else just her and the teacher.  Ruby grew to love her teacher Mrs. Henry and she was willing to be her teacher and learned to lover her as well. At the end of first grade Ruby finally realized why no one wanted to be around her and why there was such a commotion about her attending this school, and it was all because she was black. In the end she gave an update of her life and where she was at the time, this book was written. Today she still continues to fight for the rights of those not treated equally.

I liked this book because it's a firsthand account of what it was like to go through desegregation, not only go through it, but be that first step into change. I think I would surely have this in a classroom library, if not my own personal one. This book doesn't water anything down, Ruby told it exactly how it was. I think if I used this in a lesson it would be over history and what it was like back in the day, and show students that how we are all able to be in one school wasn't always possible. I think this book would be great for students in 3rd -7th grade.
- Peace. Love. Giraffes.

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