Review 2- Emma's Poem

Linda Glaser's children's book, Emma's Poem, is simplistic account of the life of the woman who wrote arguably the most famous poem about The Statue of Liberty. Emma's Poem is an ideal book to dove-tail  a unit on Citizenship in Social Studies. With it's painting like illustrations by Claire Nivola, this book will grab the attention of upper elementary school  learners and tug at their hearts as well.

As my partner has already stated Emma's Poem is a book about Emma Lazarus, a wealthy Jewish woman who had grown up in New York City with “plenty of everything.” Although she herself had never experienced suffering and poverty, she was moved when she visited Ward’s Island and saw the newly arrived immigrants, many of whom were sick and hungry. Of these immigrants, most were Jewish, like Emma, and they had left [Eastern]Europe because their friends and relatives were being killed. Emma felt as though it was her duty to help them, so she tried her best to raise awareness through her writings. Some people helped, but many felt that these immigrants would “ruin the country.” Although, at this point in time, “women kept their thoughts quiet,” Emma was a well-known writer and she was asked to submit a poem to raise money to erect the Statue of Liberty in the New York Harbor. Emma imagined that the Statue of Liberty was there to welcome the new immigrants, since that would be one of the first things they saw when they arrived, and wrote a beautiful poem for them. Many years later, Emma’s poem was placed inside the entrance of the Statue of Liberty and was sung in classrooms around the country.

This book is a teacher's dream-come-true! In simplistic language and short phrases, a teacher able to expain many things.

1. Where  did the Statue of Liberty come from? Why do we have? What does it mean? Has the meaning changed of the years? Does it mean different to different people?
2. (In light of Social Studies Core Curriculum-Grade 4) How have individuals (Emma Lazarus) help to strenghten democracy in the United States? Culturally  how has American society developped and changed? What events have played a part in uniting all Americans
3. How were early immigrants treated? What does the Statue of Liberty mean for immigrants?
4. How were the poor treated? How are they treated now?

There are a plethora of websites that offer excellent resources for parents to use to educate children on immigration, U.S. citizenship, and poetry. Here are just a few that like Emma Lazarus' famous poem, The Statue Liberty, and U.S Citizenship/Social Studies: BrainPop,  PBS,  thirteen, and my personal favorite, A Read-Alound Lesson Plan