Comment from Kevin Callahan about Hunger of Memory:

I was going to bring up a book review which depicted Richard as being angry and frustrated as a young man.  He didn't want hand outs or to be judged by the color of his skin or last name.  He wanted to be judged on his merit, hard work, and intelligence.  I am including part of the review which I thought would have been appropriate for classroom discussion.

Hunger of Memory, comprised of five separate essays, was an engaging analysis of the writer's journey from silence to voice, from anonymity to celebrity, from South to North. In it Rodriguez issued a vociferous personal attack against bilingual education and minority quotas as well as exploring his personal Catholicism and, although indirectly, his homosexuality. Before Linda Chavez and other neoconservatives, he attacked liberals for rejoicing in the promotion of blacks and Hispanics as "victims," and for allowing their guilt to shape affirmative-action programs. He argued vehemently, for example, that requiring Spanish instruction in the classroom is dangerous because it creates an abyss--a sense of separateness between the student and mainstream America.

A true agent provocateur, Rodriguez's first book, already a minor classic, became a favorite target of attack for student activists and politically correct university professors, who sometimes seemed eager to demonize the writer. But the truth is, as Ruben Martinez and other critics have perceived, that Rodriguez is not any sort of fight-winger. Political analysis is neither his interest nor his strength. Rather he is offended when his writing is used for the partisan endorsement of government programs, and he responds accordingly. He gets even angrier when his work is exploited for ideological reasons. In interviews and articles, he has described the book as another Labyrinth of Solitude, the groundbreaking study of the Hispanic psyche published in 1950 by the Mexican essayist Octavio Paz. But I find this characterization incomplete. Rodriguez's voice is alienated, anti-Romantic, often profoundly sad. While Paz embarks on an archeology of the Hispanic cultural idiosyncracy, Rodriguez is strictly personal. He does not offer historical analysis so much as meditative and speculative autobiography--a Whitmanesque "song of myself," a celebration of individuality and valor in which, against all stereotypes, a Mexican-American becomes a winner.

international.loc.gov/learn/features/immig/interv/toc.php

Library of Congress page featuring immigrant interviews. Searchable by regions of the world.

international.loc.gov/learn/features/port/start.html

Library of Congress "Port of Entry: Immigration" activity for students. Set up as  'history detectives' activity with photographs of immigrant life.

www.gilderlehrman.org/teachers/modules.html

Good modules on a variety of topics, including immigration. Includes background, resources, primary documents, lesson plans, etc. on a multitude of topics.

teacher.scholastic.com/researchtools/researchstarters/immigration/

Lots of great links to immigration sites here on "research starters".

www.teacherplanet.com/resource/immigration.php

Lesson plans, units, worksheets, and other resources on immigration and Ellis Island for the elementary level

pages.framingham.k12.ma.us/equity/HandbookforprintingFinal.pdf

A great handbook from Framingham about cultural understanding of Brazilian students.

Hi, Everyone! One of the kids I tutor just got the coolest book, and I wanted to create this page for us to share ideas and resources to use in the classroom. The book was part of a series called "Interactive History Adventure"  - they're Choose Your Own Adventure book based on real events and the choices of actual people in history. He was reading the one about the Battle of Bunker Hill, which doesn't really fit here, but they also have one on the Irish in America:

http://www.amazon.com/Irish-Immigrants-America-Interactive-Adventure/dp/1429601612/ref=sr_1_20?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1229480179&sr=8-20

and I saw one about the California Gold Rush and the Japanese Internment on Amazon as well. I haven't actually  looked through them, but I thought they might be cool to check out!

Book recommendation from Jim Hayes

I came accross an interesting book in the school library in Manchester, MA. It is a graphic novel called "The Arrival" by Shaun Tan. There are no words but rather images that depict the new world as seen through an immigrant's eyes. This is a different method of looking at the immigrant experience through the drawings of an artist and not the words of an historian. He chooses a multi-racial protaganist and does not focus on any one ethnic group. Here is an exerpt from a book review done by Gene Luen Yang in the New York Times in November of 2007:

“The Arrival” tells not an immigrant’s story, but the immigrant’s story. Its protagonist, a young father with vaguely Eurasian features, leaves his home to create a better life for his family in a distant land of opportunity. He struggles to find a job, a place to stay and a sense of meaning in his new existence. Along the way he befriends other, more established immigrants. He listens to their stories and benefits from their kindnesses. The young father reunites with his family as “The Arrival” draws to a close, and the distant land finally becomes home.

Here is the link to the full review: http://www.nytimes.com/2007/11/11/books/review/Yang-t.html 

Picturing America (by the National Endowment for Humanities) has reproductions of 40 major American works of art that can be organized by theme (democracy, leadership, courage, freedom, etc.) along with resources associated with each piece. It's pretty cool! http://picturingamerica.neh.gov/