Seven Candles for Kwanzaa

Seven Candles for Kwanzaa

Illustrated by: Andrea Davis Pinkney

Pictures by: Brian Pinkney

As the viewer, by looking at the cover I can already tell that Seven Candles for Kwanzaa Illustrated by: Andrea Davis Pinkney is going to be about a holidy. Based on the candles, the way the two young boys are nicely dressed, and the decorations that they are setting up onto the table. Also, the cover of the book is very well detailed and colorful. What this book is about is how this family is celebrating Kwanzaa this is an "...Amercian holiday inspired by African traditions" (Seven Candles for Kwanzaa from a Note to Readers) Also, this book will explain different types of languages that they family will use. This is a very good mulicultrual book for children to learn how other cultures celebrate holidays.

In the first page of  Seven Candles for Kwanzaa it explains what this holiday is all about, how it is "a family day in the part and Thanksgiving and a birthday , all rolled into one!" (pg 1) It is really interesting how some cultures will celebrate a bunch of holidays together. As my students are reading this book I will remind them them not to respect the culture and take in on how they do celebrate holidays differently. This holidy will start December 26 and will go on until the first day of January (Seven Candles for Kwanzaa pg. 1) In this book there are different meanings that explain what the holiday is all about. For example, the word "mkeka" means "a straw placemat, on a table" (Seven Candles for Kwanzaa pg. 5) Instead of having a plastic placemat like other cultures may have, they will have ones made out of straw because that is their tradition. Some other terms that they use in this book is "Muhindi" which basically means corn and "Mazao" means crops. (Seven Candles for Kwanzaa pg 5)

Throughout this book, it explains the different types of objects that they will be putting on the table for the holiday, and how it means to their culture. For this book, I would read this aloud to my students, so they can hear the proper way to pronounce some of the terms. Also, show them how detailed the pictures are because the pictures are really important for this book. With a book that has different types of terminology, pictures are a good visual to see what the words really mean. For a lesson, my students can make some of the objects that are the table. For example, we can make the seven candles. My reader response questions:

1) Why is it important to know how different cultures celebrate holidays?

2) Why do you think the author wrote this book?

References:

Google Images

Pinkney, A. D., & Pinkney, J. B. (1993). Seven candles for Kwanzaa. New York: Dial Books for Young Readers. pgs. 1, 5 Print.