A Champion for Children with Valerie Bolling

Valerie Bolling, author of A Flea for Justice: Marian Wright Edelman Stands Up for Change (Charlesbridge), illustrated by TeMika Grooms, joins Matthew to talk about a person worth writing about.

Listen along:

About the book: A Flea for Justice: Marian Wright Edelman Stands Up for Change by Valerie Bolling; illustrated by TeMika Grooms. Published by Charlesbridge.

Marian Wright Edelman is a flea for justice. Just like her hero, Sojourner Truth, Marian pushes for change even when it's uncomfortable. She makes people itch, just like a flea.

A historical and political picture book biography for 6-9-year-olds about Black perseverance. An aspiring read for future activists and changemakers!

As Marian Wright Edelman grows up, she never loses the spirit she had as a child when she swapped the signs on water fountains designating where Black and white people were allowed to drink.

Marian learns about Sojourner Truth, and she decides to make people itch in order to make change, just like Sojourner did. Marian becomes the first Black woman lawyer in Mississippi, and she creates the Children’s Defense Fund, which continues to be a voice for poor children, children of color, and children with disabilities today.

A Flea for Justice is an accessible read with a unique, kid-friendly structure; award-winning educator Valerie Bolling directly asks the kid readers questions, like--“Do you know what Sojourner told that man?” to engage in the story. An inspiring, call-to-action biography that’s sure to make readers itch!

“Marian has spent six decades bending the moral arc of the universe toward justice, and we are all the beneficiaries of her noble mission.”

—Hilary Rodham Clinton

More:

Visit Valerie Bolling online at valeriebolling.com

Other helpful links:

• Valerie Bolling at the Highlights Foundation

• Marketing Opportunities for Storytellers: A Two-Night Mini - The story is at the heart of all we do, even when we switch from crafting the story to getting the story to readers. Join award-winning writers Valerie Bolling and Janae Marks to engage and build your knowledge of marketing and promotional opportunities that you can do as a book creator in order to get your book to kids.

Transcript:

NOTE: Transcript created by Descript. I've attempted to clean up any typos, grammatical errors, and formatting errors where possible.

Matthew: [00:00:00] Welcome back to the Children's Book Podcast, where we celebrate the power of storytelling to reflect our world, expand our perspectives, and foster connections between readers of all ages, brought to you in partnership with the highlights foundation. Positively impacting kids by amplifying the voices of storytellers who inform, educate, and inspire children to become their best selves.

I'm your host, Matthew Winner teacher, librarian, writer, and a fan of kids. Before we begin, a quick reminder that you can hear the Children's Book Podcast early and ad free by subscribing on Apple Podcasts. Click the banner on your podcast app at any time today on the podcast. I'm joined by Valerie Bolling.

Award-winning author and educator to talk about her powerful new nonfiction picture book A Flea for Justice. Marian Wright Edelman stands up [00:01:00] for change, illustrated by Tamika Grooms. Marian Wright Edelman has spent her life pushing for justice for children, for families, for equity, and in Valerie's words, she's done it like a flea, a tiny, persistent, unstoppable force that makes people itch for change.

From her childhood act of bravery, swapping the signs on segregated water fountains to becoming the first black woman lawyer in Mississippi. Marian's story is one of courage, conviction, and compassion. Her lifelong work. Founding and leading the Children's Defense Fund has helped bend the moral arc of the universe toward justice for generations of young people.

Valerie Bolling brings Marian's story to life with an engaging conversational voice. That directly invites readers in asking questions that spark curiosity and action. It's an inspiring call for every young reader to stand up, [00:02:00] speak out, and make a difference. Valerie is not only a friend of the show, she's a friend.

One of my favorite moments in this interview was when she talked about stretching herself through her writing. This is a quality I ascribe to Valerie regularly, the strive to grow and learn. I hope you learn and grow from our time together with Valerie as well. Please welcome Valerie Bolling to the podcast.

Valerie: My name is Valerie Bolling and I am first and foremost an educator, but also the author of Books for Children and books for Teachers. And I'm so excited to be here today to talk about my upcoming picture book biography called a Flea for Justice. Marian Wright Edelman stands up for change. 

Matthew: [00:03:00] How fun is it that I get to say to you, Valerie?

Welcome back. How fun is it that I get to say to you? Welcome back. We've both been living some life. 

Valerie: Yes, 

Matthew: I'm glad you're here. Could you please start us off by sharing a brief book, talk of a Flea for Justice for all of those that will listen, who have not yet encountered it. 

Valerie: Sure. So first of all, thank you so much for having me back because I was here for my debut.

Let's Dance. And so it's wonderful to be back for my seventh picture book now. And a fleet incredible of justice is first of all about Marian Wright Edelman, and she is someone that children and adults should know about because she is a champion for children's rights and for civil rights, and she has really made it her life's work and she founded the Children's Defense Fund. She was helpful [00:04:00] in establishing Head Start. There are also Freedom Schools, which are connected to the Children's Defense Fund that occurred during the summer so that children are able to keep learning during the summer. And what I love about Mrs. Edelman is. While she's a champion for children, she's especially a champion for children who need it most for children of color, for children who might be struggling socioeconomically because of the adults in their lives children who might have disabilities. So it's just wonderful to tell a part of her story.

This really is just a part of it because there's so much she's done, but I want. Children to know this story and be inspired by her and know that they too can be change makers. That they can be fleas for justice. And the idea of a flea for justice comes from something [00:05:00] Sojourner Truth said. And you'll have to read the book to find out the origin, but it is about the fact that even a flea that's so tiny.

Can make a difference. It can make you scratch if it, gets on your skin and so forth. And so what are the things we might do to make people scratch so that they're motivated to create a better world? 

Matthew: I have a lot of questions about writing biographies to ask you, but first I should start with.

With why writing biographies for you? This is your first published picture book biography, and so I'd love to know what compelled you to write in this format. You might tell me that you've written a number of them, and this just happens to be the first, but I would love to hear more about writing in this format and also what compelled you to write about Miss Edelman's life.

Valerie: Sure. Thank you for that question. So I try to stretch [00:06:00] myself with writing. I had taken stock of my first five picture books. Which are all rhyming, sparse joy books. And I said, I want to write some other books and I didn't have anything nonfiction and there are so many people whose lives are worth writing about.

So I said, I wanna try my hand at picture book biography. So I read a lot of picture book biographies. I talked to some writer friends who've written picture book biographies or nonfiction books. And so I set about writing this book and this is the first one that I've written. And I.

Was wondering, I knew I wanted to write about a black woman and I was thinking, maybe someone in education. I was actually thinking about Mary McLeod Bethune. And then I was talking [00:07:00] to my mentor at the time, Kelly Starling Lyons, and she actually gave me the idea of writing about Marian Wright Edelman.

And then I remembered that a good friend. In graduate school, we were in graduate school together, and when we graduated, he gave me one of her books, which I still had the measure of our success. And so it just, it was everything came together and I just felt I, she's who I want to write about.

Matthew: That's beautiful that it happened that way, and I love that. You bring up Kelly Starling Lions. Yeah. And that she nudged and the universe nudged back and that, yes. That's wonderful. I wanna say coming straight from my library to record with you today that one of the best things among many things about new biographies coming out.

Preserving the [00:08:00] lives and works of these individuals or presenting, not preserving both maybe, but presenting the lives and works of these individuals to young readers. Is that almost always a staple of elementary school is to do biography research and let me tell you what a joy it is as the librarian on that end, to work with a team and to display picture book biographies.

All over way more than just the top of the biography shelf, but all over 

Valerie: Love 

Matthew: that and let children be drawn to the work that the cover designer and the illustrator and you and the title and all of those pieces that work together to draw in a child. We can't always use a picture book alone to do the research, of course, but that it can be.

And maybe unintimidating introduction to a person's life [00:09:00] is a really powerful thing. I did like this picture book. Why don't I try to research more on this individual? And of course we subscribe to a number of online databases for kids to do exactly that. And then when they do their research, it's reinforced through a strong.

Strongly written picture, book, biography. So I wanna say from that librarian side, I really love that you were looking at your body of work and thought I should turn to nonfiction because you're turning to a different group of readers or readers reading perhaps for a different reason. 

Valerie: Absolutely.

Thank you for sharing all that, that really just to hear it from your perspective as a librarian and this idea of what might we offer children. There are so many people's lives that they should know about that they don't necessarily learn about in class. They're not part of the curriculum, but they should know and who knows how these individuals can inspire [00:10:00] students.

Matthew: Valerie, how do you in writing this? Picture book biography, certainly. You are no monolith for all biography writers, but how do you, or how did you, in this book work to [00:11:00] decide what information to center in Marian's life and what to include in back matter? Perhaps and what maybe not to talk about it all.

I understand it has something to do with flow, but were you how present, how aware were you in that process of, I really just can't have this in order for the book to, to flow the way I wanted to. 

Valerie: Yeah, so I was pretty aware of it. One of the things I knew was I did not want to write what they call a cradle to grave story.

Correct. I didn't wanna just tell her. Excuse me. I did not want to just tell her life chronologically, so I thought about what are the aspects of her life that would be most interesting to children? Because I think as adults, there's so much about her life [00:12:00] that we would find interesting. The fact that she was the first black female.

A lawyer in Mississippi that's so interesting that she's a graduate of Spelman College and Yale Law School. These are things that adults care about or that she's married and has sons and grandchildren, but what is really going to matter to children? So that's why the story starts out with her at a water fountain and she's about four years old and she goes to drink from the white fountain and her Sunday school teacher, and you hear her tell the story like, yanks her away.

What are you doing that's not. The fountain you're supposed to drink from and later she switches the signs. Talk about a flee for justice and just having that insight and that fight and, willingness, the recognition that there's [00:13:00] something that's not right about this and I'm going to do something about it.

So to me, that's something that really appeals to kids. So that was something that I really. Knew I wanted to start the story off with. And then some of the other things I shared like about freedom schools and some kids may not think about going to school during the summer, but like freedom schools are fun.

They have a lot of fun activities. And I do mention that she marched with Dr. King because most. Students, most children know who Dr. King is. Yes. So the fact that she marched with him, this very famous person. So I tried to pull from her life the examples that would not only interest children, but that they could relate to and perhaps be inspired by.

Matthew: I like not only that you were working with that focus, but a feature of your text itself is [00:14:00] asking questions. The reader, much like I picture much like a parent or grandparent sharing with a child, oh, do you know about this person? Let me tell you about this person. And did you know what they did next?

And can you guess what they did next? Almost writing a line that's a page turn, if you will that drama of the page turn. But we hear that in good storytelling too because it makes the listener. Have stake in your story, was that a, a feature in the voice of your picture book biography from the start, or was that something that you came across?

Valerie: It was there from the start, actually, Matthew, there were two things that I knew I wanted to have in the text. One was some actual quotes from Mrs. Edelman herself, and you'll see those throughout the book. And then the other was I did want this this questioning one because I think [00:15:00] it's a great way to engage the reader.

And the other is, I. Think that sometimes some of the things I'm talking about like a f Flee for justice, I think it is natural that you would say, what does a flea have to do with justice? Or some of the other questions I had about, even, would you wanna go to school in the summer or something with Freedom School?

So I think that some of the questions I asked. Are questions that I anticipate children might actually ask. And so therefore, if I can anticipate and then respond, that's what a good teacher does, a good librarian does. Like we even parents sometimes, we anticipate what children might have questions about or what they might ask, and then, sometimes we can answer them upfront.

Matthew: And I'll say too, that also informs what we say 

Valerie: Yes. 

Matthew: [00:16:00] By you asking what would a child or children ask about Ms. Edelman's life? The answer is what you put into a biography and other things that they might not think to ask, but it, it would naturally engage or delight or, I think just the fact that.

Edelman is the the genesis of the Children's Defense Fund, children hearing that phrase together, children's Defense Fund speaks very clearly. It's named really well, it's named really well, and so to know. Th that also can be a question that a child will have, and there's a lot of history behind that and a lot of good that she's done around that.

I think that there's, yeah, I don't know. Lots of praise. I don't know what else to, I don't wanna exhaust [00:17:00] the, thank you, the thought around it, but it's picking a really great subject to share with kids, but also. Yeah. To me, Valerie, it feels like it's projecting into the future that, organizations like this exist and here's an individual who came from an age like you hearing this book.

And look at her trajectory. And it is not out of the question that you too might have a similar trajectory if you care about being a f Flee for Justice in that way. 

Valerie: Exactly. And that's one of the things I'm trying to do in the book is to encourage to really encourage that in children. I want them to realize that this is something they can do and to actually want to do it.

And part of the description of the book that you'll see online says. An aspiring read for future [00:18:00] activists and change makers, and so I'm hoping that children will take that away from the book and that the, adults who are reading the book to them will. Help them figure out ways that they might do that.

And there is Charlesbridge. The publisher was wonderful in making an educator guide for the book and I was able to give input as well. And so there are activities that allow children to do more research and to discover this and explore what it means to be a change maker a bit more, and even specifically how they might do that.

Matthew: Yeah, I think the whole team has done a really good job. E each of you that have put hands on this book. 

Valerie: Thank 

Matthew: you. Valerie, before, before we start to wrap up, I wanna ask you about your involvement with the Highlights foundation, because that's who's connecting us, which is lovely. Any one of us could have been, we were connecting as friends, [00:19:00] could have been Charlesbridge.

We have lots of yes strings that connect us in a wonderful way, but. I am aware that you've co-hosted the Black Voices Retreat an in community retreat, and that you've done some summer camp work in highlights. Yes. Yes. And I had a note from my high, one of my highlights, pals, that you may have met the illustrator of this book at.

Yes. Highlight. Is that true? This book? This book? 

Valerie: Yes. 

Matthew: Oh, that's cool. I 

Valerie: did, yes. That's an interesting story. I if I'll just say quickly, I found out that the book was acquired when I was at highlights with a group called Amplified Black Stories, which highlights and the Brown Bookshelf were sponsoring and Tamika Grooms the.

Amazing illustrator of this book was there, and I don't remember exactly what happened now because it was several years ago, but I remember saying, I feel, I said to her, would you be interested in [00:20:00] illustrating this book? Or maybe she initiated and said, oh, I'd love to illustrate that book. And so when it came time to choose illustrators, I passed her name along.

Oh great. And it worked out that she got the gig and I'm so glad she did. 

Matthew: That's cool. And that I feel it in teaching too, but we just don't ever know who will cross paths with and how so true. Our stories may intertwine in the future. It really is a testament to just walking through the world in a. With kindness and with love.

Yes. And in a way that that you are hoping that the universe will give you a future interaction with whomever the individual is. 

Valerie: Yeah, so you were asking about, was the question about teacher? My involvement also? 

Matthew: Yeah, 

Valerie: With highlights and so yeah. Highlights is just wonderful and they've been so supportive of me even reconnecting us again in this [00:21:00] way.

But I have been fortunate to have spent the past four summers at highlights two as a faculty member. For their summer camp and fiction. And then the last two co-hosting with Jazz Hammonds, who's also fabulous. The Black Voices Retreat. I know. Goodness, I love Jazz Hammonds. They were on your show recently.

Such a small world. Yeah, and I've taught classes for them as well. I've taught, I think this will be the third time I will teach in November. A marketing and publicity class with Janae Marks, that's a virtual workshop. I was fortunate enough to receive a Renee Watson scholarship where I was able to be at highlights for a week.

And during that time I wrote half of my first book for teachers. That book that came out in June. Yes. Goal setting. In the writing classroom, and I'm now concurrently [00:22:00] working on books two and three because book two is co-authored with Pamela Courtney, and we're in a bit of a holding pattern right now.

We've done what we can do and we're just waiting. And I have already started work on book three that I'm doing. On my own. Anyway, highlights. I just, they connected me to Tamika and I had the opportunity to have this space to write half of a half of a book for teachers. And so there's just so much that's wonderful about highlights.

It really is family. Everyone there, they're committed Matthew to the things that we are committed to in terms of, oh 

Matthew: yeah. 

Valerie: And a world for everyone and just, and looking out for people who are marginalized, people who giving space to people. And of course everyone talks about the amazing food with Chef Amanda and her team.

I love that. Yeah. Which is true. And the environment is [00:23:00] beautiful. So it's just I'm just so grateful to be a part of the highlights family. 

Matthew: Same. I'm grateful to have served as faculty, both online and in person. And also to be in partnership with them because as we were saying it's a chance to hear from a lot of really terrific voices and already we've heard, from so many, you included. I love, as you brought up, that I met Jazz who I had not known before because I spend most of my life working with children in an elementary school. 

Valerie: Right. 

Matthew: And so unless someone recommends to me, I don't often read ye 'cause I'm reading for my students. But how wonderful to not only read their book, but to also.

Make the connection when they were sharing about their teaching at highlights. And go, I know who you're teaching. I know. That's really terrific. It's all to say that I hope that you continue to bring more stories into the world, both. By your own hand and also through the teaching that you do and those individuals that [00:24:00] you help along the way.

Valerie: Thank you, Matthew.

Matthew: Of course.  

Valerie: I hope so too. And on both accounts, I hope to bring more into the world and it's a tough, I'm not going to lie, it's a tough time right now and the. Picture book market. But I am hoping to share other stories. There is another picture book biography that I've written that I would love to see made into a book.

And I do get, and I can imagine you feel similarly when you introduce a book to a child that the child just loves and their face lights up. I feel similarly when I work with. Either children and they write their stories or adults. I love teaching both children and adults and so when they bring their stories to fruition and they feel empowered and that, they've taken a story from point A to B, C, or Z, it gives me such joy.

It really does. 

Matthew: That's terrific. Speaking of all of those [00:25:00] individuals who you work with and who I work with and where we all meet in the middle, I'd love to close by asking you, Valerie, that I will see a library full of children tomorrow morning. Is there a message that I can bring to them from you?

Valerie: Oh my goodness. This just touches me so deeply because there are so many things I could say. It's tough to know what to say, but since I know they'll be in a library which has books, I will center my message on that, and I would say to them. As cliched as it sounds. Read as many of the books as you can read widely.

Enjoy what you read and get inspiration. Get inspiration from these books for your own writing. Get inspiration about how you want to live your life, maybe how you want to. Be a friend. Because a lot of the books I'm sure they're reading have to do with friends and [00:26:00] friendship in different ways. And I would also tell them that if any adult tells you shouldn't read a book, here's a chance to be a flee for justice and fight back.

Because you really, unless you know you're a five or 6-year-old wanting to read ya, but if it's something that it, you should be allowed to read. I want them to read that. And so I just want them to enjoy a variety of books and I want them to celebrate themselves no matter who they are and however ways they come into the world and come into spaces,

I want them to just know that they matter and to feel comfortable with who they are. Even, I will say this, my 13-year-old niece has her email address is Be yourself and then it's ZC because those are her initials. But even her, at age 13, she's saying, be [00:27:00] yourself. And so I will lead with Zora's while, or, leave with Zora's. Wise words to say, be yourself and enjoy life.

You're a child, you're young. There are so many things to enjoy. I know that they feel stress, but I hope that they're able to put that aside and enjoy. That's a lot to share with them. I know there's always so much to share with children and students.