Books of Hope

Helping my students widen their view of the world has always been one of my classroom goals.  The idea that every kid in the world doesn’t play soccer (or hockey), shop at Abercrombie and eat at Applebees can be a shocking revelation to elementary school kids.  When they see pictures of how children live in third world countries they don’t understand why the children are smiling.  They learn that kids can be happy even if they don’t live in American suburbs, provided they have food, love, shelter and an opportunity to grow and learn.  When I have given the kids a chance to work on projects that allow them to make a difference in the world they suddenly become so motivated to read, write, learn, present, create, discuss and, most importantly, think about how they can help others.  Their 10 yr. old supercharged energy take on a new mature purpose when they are empowered to help.

The chance to foster empathy and work on a real world problem led me to enroll my students in the  Books of Hope program several years ago.  Books of Hope was started by Ben Schumaker when he was a graduate student at the University of Wisconsin, the current director is Abha Thakkar.  Their concept is simple:  children in America write and illustrate ‘books’ and BOH ships them to children in Uganda whose war torn lives are in desperate need of learning and joy.  My students were so excited to become real authors...they wrote adventure stories, made diagrams for books about animals and thought up creative ABC books.  At the end of the year we shipped our books to Wisconsin where they joined forces with other books from across America  Containers of books were then shipped to schools and shelters in Uganda.  Abha Thakkar travelled to Uganda to facilitate the deliver of the books and sent back remarkable pictures of happy children cradling our books.  There is a beautiful video of her delivery trip on their website, the smiles and songs of the children will give you goosebumps on your goosebumps.  Recently, “Books of Hope” has gone digital and is providing books to a group of 17 sister schools.  The children in these schools will have their first taste of library solace. Despite their difficult and sometimes dangerous surroundings they will have the chance to choose a book and get lost in it, to create a new reality for themselves and let their fears melt away for a moment.  Abha Thakkar puts it beautifully, “Books are food for the soul and shelter for the spirit. A single book can contain a universe of hope and possibility. Books - and the learning and imagination they inspire - allow us to explore our potential and become fully alive.  
So keep writing kids...the children in Uganda are counting on you...