If A Bus Could Talk: The Story of Rosa Parks

Girl gets on talking bus on way to school. Bus begins to talk, all passengers on bus for a reason. Bus begins explaining the life of Rosa Parks and the Civil Rights Movement. The bus stops when the story is done, and Rosa Parks gets on the bus. They celebrate her birthday on the bus. The bus

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finally lets the girl off at her school and girl is excited to tell everyone what happened. Genre: Historical Fiction- the story is based on the Civil Rights Movement and includes many accurate details of it. It also includes much of Rosa Park's biography. The story is not actual history because it includes a talking bus, and a fictional story about the girl. Characterization: Rosa is a round character because her whole background, motives, and growth are documented throughout the story. Media: canvas and oil paints

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This is a biography about Rosa Parks talking about her life and about how she refused to give up her seat. This story is told in a partly fiction way in that a little girl gets onto a talking bus which then proceeds to tell her about Rosa Parks.

I love the illustrations in the book. The colors are really vibrant. It was an interesting twist to a historical biography. It gave quite a bit of back information about Rosa Parks as well as post Bus Boycott information. This would be a great book to introduce a biography or history with a

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different twist and perspective to the story to an upper elementary class.

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If A Bus Could Talk by Faith Ringgold is a good civil rights book. It tells the story of Rosa Parks and how she was forced to ride in the back of the bus. It talks about how white people were allowed to ride the school bus to school and she had to walk miles and miles to get there. It tells

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Rosa’s story of when she refused to give up her seat for a white person. This book is a good way to teach younger students about the issues African Americans faced during the Civil Rights Movement.

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This story tells about the lfie of Rosa Parks told by the bus she rode on. It begins at Parks' birth and goes through the end of her life. The story is very detailed and a long read for young children, so I chose parts to share with them. Parks' story is told by the bus using facts from her real

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life and illustrations that are colorful and fun. The back of the book has notes for the reader on the history of the story and Rosa Parks' contribution to the ending of segregation.

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If A Bus Could Talk by Faith Ringgold is a good civil rights book. It tells the story of Rosa Parks and how she was forced to ride in the back of the bus. It talks about how white people were allowed to ride the school bus to school and she had to walk miles and miles to get there. Faith Ringgold

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uses literary elements to tell an historical story firsthand. The idea of a girl boarding a talking bus, the actual bus that transported Rosa Parks is engaging and exciting.
After reading, we would have a discussion...
1)What if you could travel back in time? How would you feel?
2)What could you learn?

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A fictional character ends up on a bus which knows a whole lot about Rosa Parks and American history. The bus introduces the reader to Rosa Parks' story and the background of segregation, racial hatred, and the civil rights movement. Our character ends up meeting Rosa Parks and celebrating her

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birthday.

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NAACP Image Award Nominee. Every page contains colorful illustrations to enhance the story. The little girl and Rosa also sing a song together: “O Freedom Over Me.”

Part E Biography

Ringgold, F. (1999). If a bus could talk: the story of Rosa Parks. New York: Simon & Schuster Books for Young Readers.

Marcie hops onto a bus that doesn’t look like her regular school bus. Once on, she realizes that there is no driver and the bus is talking. It recounts the life

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story Rosa Parks from her childhood to her fight for Civil Rights. Marcie learns about the segregation laws and about the Alabama Bus Boycott. By the end of the bus ride she knows why Rosa Parks was so important and why she is regarded as an important factor in the Civil Rights movement. Ringgold offers a story that shows the importance of equality and human rights. It documents the life of Rosa Parks in a picture book. Ages 7-10.

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In this book a bus does talk, and on her way to school a girl named Marcie learns why Rosa Parks is the mother of the Civil Rights movement. At the end of Marcie's magical ride, she meets Rosa Parks herself at a birthday party with several distinguished guests.

Genre: Historical fiction
This is a good historical fiction. Through the eyes of a little girl, the reader finds out the story of Rosa Parks.
Media; Paint
Age: Primary / Intermediate

The genre of this book is two-fold. Since the bus is the actually person narrating this story that makes this book a good example of a fantasy, since that cannot happen. Furthermore, the book is also a good example of a biography, because it tells the life story of Rosa Parks. The illustrations in

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this book are also very good. They add a lot to the story by giving the reader images about the setting and characters. The illustrations are also painted on canvas, which can be seen through the paint and gives the illustrations great texture.

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This story gives details about Rosa Parks’s childhood through her involvement as a leader with the NAACP. It begins as a fictional account of a child riding the Rosa Parks’s bus. Then it goes into a historial account of Mrs. Parks’s life. It gives readers an understanding of the racism that

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she endured throughout her life which led to the bus incident. And, it goes beyond the bus arrest detailing her involvement in the struggle for Civil Rights. Teaching ideas include a social studies unit on civil rights or injustice, and I would include grades 2-5. The illustrations were colorful and had a childlike characteristic with bold, bright colors that children will enjoy.

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Marcie accidentally gets on the wrong bus one day, but with doing so is told the story of Rosa Parks, The story is told by through a very original way, it is told through the bus that Mrs. parks was asked to leave from. Dr. Martin Luther King is also mentioned in the story for some of his civil

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rights work. In the end the whole bus including Mrs, Parks celebrate her birthday

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If a Bus Could Talk, the Story of Rosa Parks by Faith Ringgold, is brightly illustrated and puts the story of Rosa Parks into a story 1st graders can understand. One day Marcie boards a bus to go to school but discovers she is on the same bus that Rosa Parks refused to give her seat up on. As she

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takes a ride, she learns about Rosa Park's life and what lead her to the choice she made that day.

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This was a great biographical picture book of Rosa Parks starting with her early life and continuing into her adult life after the boycott when she left Alabama after losing her job and moving north to Michigan. The whole story was told by a talking bus and it was like an imagined episode for the

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little girl, but it was very educational and well told.

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I would use this story to discuss in groups about what they learned from the story and the things that they retained and then go back to their own seats and write the differences from then until now and how they have come to that conclusion. They will enjoy this book because it is learning about

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things that have happened before their own time.

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Every student will learn about Rosa Parks and the story she went through. This is a historical story that you could use in a history lesson.

This is a good book sharing the historical story of Rosa Parks and her fight for equality. This is a great childrens book to share during history.

The book is about a young girl named Marcie. She was trying to get on her bus for school and ended up getting on the Cleveland avenue bus. She finds out it isn't her bus for school but gets a history lesson from the bus itself about Rosa Parks. It starts when she was born and talks about her hard

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life. Then it explains why the bus is so important to Rosa's story. Telling of how she took a stand (well a sit), because she didn't give her seat up to a white man. It goes on to say how she was arrested and got her people motivated to take a stand.In the end, she gets dropped off at her school and learned so much.
Use: to teach about Rosa parks, to teach about culture.
Genre: Biography
Media: colored pencil

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I really enjoyed this book by Faith Ringgold, titled “If A Bus Could Talk: The Story of Rosa Parks.” It was a unique way to mix a narrative of a little girl, with a magical twist to teach a lesson on civil rights. Little Marcie, who is the main character in the story, did not know that her ride

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to school would turn into a magical ride back into time. When the bus started talking to her, she quickly realized that her suspicions of this bus was correct. This bus was like no other as it could talk. When it requested for her to keep a special seat reserved for the day, her inquiry led her on an adventure that she would never forget. The storytelling bus, gave her a tour that illustrated a glimpse of the life of Rosa Parks and her struggle for civil rights. I enjoyed reading this book because it gave me a worth of facts that I did not know about Rosa Parks in a colorful way. I give this book four out of five stars. It was a great book, but it was somewhat lengthy for a picture book. If I was teaching with this book to early elementary students, I would spread this read-aloud out to two, or even three-day period.

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A strange-looking/talking bus picks up a young girl named Marcie. During her bus ride, the bus tells the story Rosa Parks. It gives childhood history about Rosa Parks' all the way through her adult life and the events to lead up the the Civil Rights movement. This would be a good book to introduce

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segregation and Civil Rights to children.

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This book tells the story of Rosa Parks' life through the perspective of a bus.