Product Description

When four courageous black teens sat down at a lunch counter in the segregated South of 1960, the reverberations were felt both far beyond and close to home. This insightful story offers a child's-eye view of this seminal event in the American Civil Rights Movement. Connie is used to the signs and customs that have let her drink only from certain water fountains and which bar her from local pools and some stores, but still . . . she'd love to sit at the lunch counter, just like she's seen other girls do.

Showing how an ordinary family becomes involved in the great and personal cause of their times, it's a tale that invites everyone to celebrate our country's everyday heroes, of all ages.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #391391 in Books
• Published on: 2004-12-29
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Hardcover
• 32 pages

Features

• ISBN13: 9780803728608
• Condition: NEW
• Notes: Brand New from Publisher. No Remainder Mark.
• Click here to view our Condition Guide and Shipping Prices

From School Library Journal
Kindergarten-Grade 4–Connie likes to shop downtown with her mother. When they feel tired and hot, they stop in at Woolworth's for a cool drink, but stand as they sip their sodas since African Americans aren't allowed to sit at the lunch counter. Weatherford tells the story from the girl's point of view and clearly captures a child's perspective. Connie wants to sit down and have a banana split, but she can't, and she grumbles that, "All over town, signs told Mama and me where we could and couldn't go." When her father says that Dr. King is coming to town, she asks, "Who's sick?" She watches as her brother and sister join the NAACP and participate in the Greensboro, NC, lunch counter sit-ins. Eventually, Connie and her siblings get to sit down at the counter and have that banana split. Lagarrigue's impressionistic paintings convey a sense of history as they depict the pervasive signs of a Jim Crow society. An author's note about the 1960 Greensboro sit-ins concludes the book, pointing out the role young African Americans played in the struggle for civil rights. This book will pair well with Angela Johnson's A Sweet Smell of Roses (S & S, 2005).–Mary N. Oluonye, Shaker Heights Public Library, OH
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

From Booklist
Gr. 1-3. Set in Greensboro, North Carolina, in 1960, this picture book tells a story of desegregation from the viewpoint of one little girl. Growing up in the South, Connie understands that there are places where she and other African Americans can and cannot eat, drink, swim, and use the bathroom. But after Dr. King visits the local college chapel to preach and her older siblings become active in the NAACP, she also knows that her people are working for change. When her brother's friends sit down at a dime-store lunch counter that refuses them service, their act of peaceful protest starts a wave of similar demonstrations that brings better times to their community and throughout the South. An author's note gives background information about the events in Greensboro that year. Simple and straightforward, the first-person narrative relates events within the context of one close-knit family. Though rather dark, the well-composed, painterly illustrations show up well from a distance. A handsome book for classroom reading, even for middle-grade students. Carolyn Phelan
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved

Review
Simple and straightforward, the first-person narrative relates events within the context of one close-knit family. -- Booklist

Customer Reviews

amd44
As a teacher assistant and Sunday school teacher, I thoroughly enjoyed this book. I read this book to my seven and 8-year-old Sunday school class and they really enjoyed the pictures and the message given. I live in North Carolina not to far from where the sit-ins took place and it's nice to be able to read about something that has happen within your community and the positive outcome that happened.
The book was very well written by Carol Weatherford not so much that only an older child could read it but I felt that even a younger child could understand the language with guidance.
This book has been added to my collection for Black History month.

From the author
Begun by teenagers, the sit-ins breathed new life into the civil rights movement, sparking a decade of mass protests that eventually ushered change. I live in the same county where the sit-ins took place. I hope that Freedom on the Menu helps today's children understand segregation and that freedom had a price.

Great history book for kids.
My boys loved this book. It was written so that kids can easily understand what sit ins meant and how to handle a situation without aggression. All parents should read this book to their kids. This book should be a required reader for all teachers.