Out of Iraq: Refugees' Stories in Words, Paintings and Music

Out of Iraq: Refugees' Stories in Words, Paintings and Music was written by Sybella Wilkes, with the foreword by Angelina Jolie, who is an UNHCR Goodwill Ambassador. It was published by Evans in 2010.

Out of Iraq: Refugees' Stories in Words, Paintings and Music is one of the most beautifully written and engaging nonfiction books I have ever read.  It begins with the story of Saddam Hussein and his reign of power.  It explains how he came to power, the people he executed along the way and the model he was to his sons, who were evil beings themselves who enjoyed killing and torturing other people, including family members.  The story of Suddam needed to be introduced at the beginning of this book so readers would clearly understand where the refugees were coming from and why they needed to leave. After reading this, I have realized how similar all wars are. The most famous was is WWII, due to the millions of Jewish murders, but all wars have had this happen. The killings are not to the extent of the millions Hitler executed, but the reasoning is the same -- they don't believe a certain group of people is good enough to live.

The remainder of the book is stories of different refugees -- from children to musicians to artists to regular people.  Each person described their hardships and what was going on in the country near them.  The first young boy, Hussam (his name was changed for the book), has only known a life of war.  He was born in 1991 when the war was approaching his city of Baghdad, so his country has been at war his entire life.  He states, "Despite the hardship, my first six years in school were happy.  I was surrounded by friends and we were able to be children.  The invasion of 2003 changed everything.  On 20 March we were all at school.  By the evening the bombing had begun.  I stayed at home, as did all my friends.  On 9 April, Baghdad fell to the Americans."  After this happened, his schooling was severely interrupted. His parents were adamant about him continuing school, but he had to often switch schools as each one became increasingly dangerous. His family finally moved to Syria where they could stay safe.

Another refugee, Waleed, is an Iraqui artist.  He had to leave Iraq and went to Turkey after the bombing at Samarra.  At this time, Saddam Hussein had been eliminated, but the new war he was living through was worse than what Saddam had led while he was in power.  Waleed didn't know who to look out for and who to avoid, as there were so many religious and political groups that were fighting each other.  He was unable to continue in Baghdad when you started to need to change your identify daily to survive.  He states, "In order to live in Baghdad you had to change  your identify or ethnic affiliation all the time.  One day you were Sunni.  The next Shiite  why? Because fake checkpoints would stop your car and ask about the identify and faith of the passengers.  All my friends hold two identify cards: Sunni and Shiite!  His spirit was exhausted by the war and he needed to leave.  Waleed's greatest wish is to go back to Iraq and live his life as before the war.

These are just two of the many examples of stories given within this book. The straightforward, easily read book, with personal stories makes you want to continue reading without putting the book down. The photographs are also just beautiful. They pull out so much emotion from the people in them and you can see the struggle they have had to go through.  There is one photograph of a row of homes. These homes have no walls. They have no floors.  They have no real ceiling.  They are barely tents, yet they are where thousands of people make a home.  To see this, compared to the luxury we live in, is an eye opener.  I feel as though the photographs would pull our students in. Many of our students do not live in the best of neighborhoods, none of them have had the life of a young child in Iraq, or any other war torn country, and I believe these photographs would help give some perspective to their lives. 

I suggest you read this book. You can find it at Worldcat.  Once you have read it, visit the Iraqi Refugee Assistance Program to find out more information about Iraqi refugees, as well as ways you can help.

Brave Girl: Clara and the Shirtwaist Makers' Strike of 1909

Brave Girl: Clara and the Shirtwaist Makers' Strike of 1909 was written by Michelle Markel and illustrated by Melissa Sweet.

Brave Girl: Clara and the Shirtwaist Makers' Strike of 1909 is the story of Clara Lemlich.  She immigrated to the United States in the early 1900s with the rest of her family.  After settling in, they realized no one would hire her father, but would hire her, so she got a job as a shirt maker. 

Clara was very smart and she was not going to allow the fact that she had to work get in the way of her education.  She read as often as possible and went to school at night, but soon realized the other women working with her were forced to give up their schooling because of the hard conditions of their job.  They didn't have the time or energy to do both. 

Clara organizes a strike within her company several times, but "Each time Clara leads a walkout, the bosses fire here.  Each time she pickets, her life is in danger.  The bosses hire men to beat her and other strikers. The police arrest her 17 times.  They break six of her ribs, but they can't break her spirit. It's shatterproof." Although this is happening, Clara does not give up.  She organizes a strike of all the factory workers and "starts the largest walkout of women workers in US history."

Clara's strike worked.  It took several months, but the factory owners allowed for unions to be created, shortened the work week and gave raises to all of the girls.  Clara's story inspired other walkouts in garment factories in Chicago and Philadelphia. 

Markel gives the reader more insight about the garment industry in his notes at the back of the book.  She tells us, "Between 1880 and 1920, two million Jews immigrated to America, fleeing persecution, pogroms and poverty in Russia, Ukraine, Poland, and other parts of Eastern Europe.  Many of the immigrants found work in the booming garment industry. Abuses were rampant throughout the industry.  Mnay bosses shaved time off lunch hours, set clocks back at the end of the day to fool workers, made them work long hours -- including illegal evening work -- for little money, forced them to pay for cloth soiled with blood or spilled food and fired them at will."  Clara had been able to change these conditions for the women of the time, and is hailed a hero to those she helped.

This is a picture book and I think the illustrations matched the story well.  The illustrations were muted colors, which made it look like the time it was set in.  Many of the illustrations that depicted trouble were on the left, such as when she is talking to the other girls about starting the strike and where she is pacing back and forth, worrying about her schooling.  There is also the use of diagonal lines -- her eyes meet with the males from her work at a diagonal, showing her anger about the issues she is dealing with.

This would be a good book to give students information about unions, women workers and immigration. You can find a local copy of this book by visiting WorldCat.

The Kids' Money Book

The Kids' Money Book was written by Jamie Kyle McGillian and illustrated by Ian Phillips.  It was published by Sterling Publishing in 2003.

The Kids' Money Book is an informational book about teaching kids how to earn, save, spend, invest and donate money.  It is separated into six chapters -- Moments in Money, Money Matters, Making It, Using Your Money Smarts, Growing It, and You're in Control. 

I chose this book because I am all about Dave Ramsey and his budgeting advice and guidance he gives adults for financial planning, so I thought it would be interesting to see what financial advice McGillian gives to kids.  Not surprisingly, it is very similar to what Dave gives to adults.  In the introduction, McGillian writes, "Some parents say the only thing their kids know about money is how to spend it.  Is that true about you? If it is, unless your guardian angel has deep pockets, you are in for trouble -- because money makes the world go 'round!" He uses the rest of the book to teach the best ways to earn, save, and use your money.

The first chapter, Moments in Money, is about the history of our money. This could be a little dull and boring for our kids, so he presented it in more of an interesting way. Instead of wordy paragraphs, he used a quick timeline, highlighting important dates and information about how money was made or used around that time.  There are also fun stories incorporated in, such as the Yap people literally making money out of large boulders.  They used rocks as money as a deterrent to people stealing the money.

Chapter two, Money Matters, McGillian starts off with a money quiz, asking what we would do in certain financial situations, such as finding money in a old coat, getting cash for a birthday and wanting something that is out of your price range. He is trying to determine the importance of spending money wisely. Depending on your answers, you get a certain score, and he gives advice for each score range, suggesting how to use your money in a different way or save until you have what you need to buy what was out of your price range.

The rest of the chapters go through suggestions on how to make  money (allowance, car wash, lemonade stand, after school jobs), and how to spend, save and invest money.  His chapters are broken up with lists, stories, quizzes and illustrations, which makes it a quick read and something kids could attend to.  Many of the headings are asking the reader a question, which makes you want to read on to see how the question was answered.  He has suggestions for kids of all ages and progresses through the book with the understanding that many readers will have many different experiences with money and gives different advice for different levels of experience. 

The one part of the book I wasn't thrilled with was the illustrations.  This book is intended for kids at an age where making money is plausible, but many of the illustrations were of young kids, or even babies, and I didn't care for that.  There were also some illustrations using adults. I feel as though the illustrations should reflect the people this book was written for -- school age kids and teenagers.  Illustrations aside, this is definitely something I would want to share with my children to help explain why we mandate that a third of their allowance goes into savings. 

After reading, if you'd like to have some fun and give more information to kids, you can go to The Mint, which has fun games and good suggestions on how to help kids be financially literate.