Dead Presidents

Dead Presidents
Originally uploaded by ujima.

When I taught children in 5th & 6th grades for 37 years, I taught
them about our great country. But I did not, at any time, try
to paint the founding fathers as perfect gods. Children were
able to accept the wonder of the founding of our country
and accept the human mistakes made without losing pride and
faith in America. Many Americans, including authors of our
history texts,can only deal fairy tale accounts of our early
presidents and other leaders. I think our country would have
been and could be much stronger if we weaved in the stories
of the Africans, Chinese, Mexicans and other groups who
played such an important part in the development
of this country.
The walls of my bedroom display many of the artworks
the children did during my career. This one is from 1989
and was painted by Delone Sesay.

We took Mom to the doctor today and she got an excellent
report! She doesn't have to take any further medicines to
reduce swelling. Of course, she wanted to go to the shore but
remembered reading in the newspaper that New Jersey was
closed!!!