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Young American
Heroes takes a break-the-mold approach to telling the story
of America's past to middle school students. It does so by using
ordinary kids doing extraordinary things during key moments in
American history. Our mission is to give "Our nation's future
leaders a clear idea of who we are, what we stand for, and where
we are heading." Young American Heroes is designed to do this by
providing tweens with positive, peer role models who not only
made the right decisions, but in so doing, changed the history
of America in their own small but powerful ways. This series
will provide students with a strong ethical compass as they
watch peers making good and moral decisions—and the teacher
tools will help encourage discussion and writing about how the
actions of any one individual can affect the course of history.
For instance, Melba Beals, as a 16-year-old, integrated Little
Rock High School – and yet in her modesty, claimed it was
something that any teenager could have done, "While the nine of
us may have been pre-selected, there really are nine, ten,
thirty, forty, fifty kids in every community that could have
done that. If given the opportunity, you'd be surprised at how
much you can do, how much you can achieve." Elisha Stockwell
helped free the slaves as a soldier fighting for the Union for
four years. He left home a child of 15 and returned a man – and
a citizen of a nation where all peoples, both black and white,
were now free.
In addition to Frederick Douglass, the other four stories
planned for our 5-part series are:
• Mohawk Princess – The Eunice Williams Story (1704)
• Night Rider – Sybil Ludington (1777)
• Westward Ho! The John Sager Story (1844)
• Soldier Boy The Elisha Stockwell Story (1861)
Read the latest draft of our script for the story on Frederick
Douglass. Then join the message board on that page to comment.
We want to know what you think about our characters, about the
locations, about our approach to the story. Does the dialogue
sound like "real" kids talking? Ask your students to send us
words they use...jargon like Snap, Gnarly, roll (as in I am
going to roll in a 300). For more information, visit
http://www.youngamericanheroes.com/.
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