A Dream World

Yesterday, I facilitated my girl's book club. Each month, we read two picture books by African-American authors and illustrators. My selections for July were Destiny's Gift by Nastasha Anatasia Tarpley and illustrated by Adjoa J. Burrowes and I Dream For You a World: A Covenant for Our Children by Charisse Carney-Nunes and illustrated by Ann Marie Williams.

Destiny's Gift, with its touching storyline about a girl's connection to a community bookstore, drew them right in. They loved the image of bookstore owner Mrs. Wade closing her eyes as Destiny read her stories. They felt sadness as they learned with Destiny that the bookstore might close for good. Their favorite pictures were those of celebration. One girl pointed out the balloons flying in the air and the smiling faces as the community came together to try to save the store. The final image of Mrs. Wade and Destiny hugging taught them that some situations are tough to figure out, but there's always hope .

Hope was a strong theme in our next book -- one of our group's favorites so far-- I Dream for You a World. This beautiful story poem makes the tenets of Tavis Smiley's best-seller, The Covenant with Black America, real and accessible for children. The girls eagerly discussed the way we could help bring Charisse's dream to life. Their eyes lit up as I reminded them we would speak to the author in a few minutes on speaker phone.

They proudly shared with me the questions they would ask her such as why she wrote the book, how she came up with the title and how she became an author. When we called, they kneeled around the phone, eyes wide with excitement as they listened to Charisse's answers. When she shared that she thought of being a writer in third grade, they tugged on each other's arms. Many of them are near or at that age.

Charisse's book imagines a world where all of our children have food, a good education, safe and clean communities, justice, a sense of history and freedom. It's a powerful message and it was a powerful meeting. The girls turned serious as they discussed what they want to see in our world: Clean highways. Fair trials. Democracy. Good schools for everyone.

Then, they created collages and drawings that brought their dream worlds to life.

One girl cut her construction paper into a triangle and pasted a beautiful mansion on it. Her dream was for everyone to have a house to live in, food to eat and tea parties :).

Another girl drew an earth-shaped American flag. Her mother is a lawyer. She dreamed of a world where everyone had justice.

Still another drew the world complete with named continents. She pasted smiling children all around. It expressed her desire for kids everywhere to have a safe, loving world to grow and thrive in.


What a world. What a gift Charisse's book is.