History Talk: Tonya Bolden's Maritcha: A 19th Century American Girl, Part 2

n February 9, 2010. Sponsored by Telling America's Story

Telling America's Story (TAS) is an intensive, federally-funded professional development project for American History Teachers in elementary, middle, and high schools in the Bronx Community School Districts 8, 11, & 12. Philip Panaritis and Brian Carlin, Project Directors. TAS is a partnership with the New York City Department of Education and the history and education departments of major universities and cultural institutions.
The program combines content-rich traditional American History and teaching skills development for Teacher-Historians. Workshops take place in museums, historic houses, and universities. Instruction and content is provided by nationally-known historians and educators. Teachers develop original US history curriculum units and activities. Trips, book signings, and walking tours of historical sites are also important aspects of the TAS program. Ms. Bolden had visited many of the classes of the teachers gathered here. Behind her are samples of projects made by some of those classes.

About Ms. Bolden

Growing up, Tonya Bolden thought one day she would be a teacher. Today, as an award-winning author of more than 20 books for young people and adults, she is just that. Her classroom has no walls. Instead, you just need to pick up one her acclaimed books on topics such as the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., George Washington Carver or Reconstruction to step into the world she creates. History, she has said, is her passion. She passes that rich knowledge of the past on to people around the world. Along with being a talented researcher, Bolden is known as a gifted storyteller who turns facts into something more transcendent stories that move, challenge and inspire.

about Maritcha:

from the book flap:
To do the best for myself with the view of making the best of myself. wrote Maritcha Remond Lyons about her childhood.
Maritcha was born in New York City in 1848. For most of her youth, she and her family lived in lower Manhattan. Much of Maritcha's life there mirrored that of many children of the time: helping with the housework, attending school, and practicing the piano. Yet there were thrilling occasions as well, such as visiting the Crystal Palace, site of Americas first worlds fair. However, Maritcha's life took a dramatic turn in 1863, when, at the age of fifteen, she and her family had to flee from their home in the midst of the violent Draft Riots. They eventually resettled in Providence, Rhode Island, where Maritcha triumphantly overcame prejudice to become the first black person to graduate from Providence High School.
Based on an unpublished memoir by Ms. Lyons ~ Memories of Yesterdays: All of Which I Saw and Part of Which I Was, dated 1928 ~ the evocative text and photographs of young Maritcha, her family, and their friends, as well as archival maps, photographs, and illustrations, make this book an invaluable cultural and historical resource. Maritcha brings to life the story of a very ordinary yet remarkable girl of nineteenth-century America.
»» James Madison Book Award Winner
»» Coretta Scott King Author Honor Book
»» YALSA Best Book for Young Adults
»» ALSC Notable Childrens Book