DEDICATED TO:
TRU T. EVANS
"Tru's First Day of School" follows little Tru, a soon to be confident school aged boy, as he embarks on his first day of school. Author S'ken Evans highlights the importance of social-emotional learning through the theme of confidence, which falls under the key competencies of self-awareness and self-regulation.
As a Black father and school leader, Evans understands how vital confidence is for Black boys from a young age. In this story, he shines a light on building self-assurance in our Black youth to counter the school-to-prison-pipeline that disproportionately impacts boys of color.
Most importantly, "Tru's First Day of School" illustrates how school provides Black children from urban communities the opportunity to dream big and envision future success. This book emphasizes that social-emotional learning lays the groundwork for molding our Black children into the leaders of tomorrow by fostering self-belief from the starting gate of their educational journey. S'ken Evans delivers a timely message about empowering future generations through building confidence from an early age.
MEET THE AUTHOR:
S'KEN EVANS
Pictured here with his wife and children.
(From left) Zion, Nettea, S'ken, and Tru.
S'ken Evans is a father, husband, a clergyman and educator.
Evans really nailed multiple ways to include research from the science of reading for both a lower and upper elementary classroom.
The story features rich vocabulary with multisyllabic words like laughter, children, and courageous which supports educators when introducing morphology instruction. It also includes words with complex sounds like rumble, boom, and bop - known as onomatopoeia - which develops phonological awareness. Finally, the story features a problem and solution that students can easily relate to as everyone has experienced a first day at school.
This familiar content knowledge helps comprehension. Following the characters throughout also aids understanding of deeper meaning.
The author includes multiple multisylabic words which supports educators when introducing morpholgy instruction which typically focuses on one of two types of word parts - affixes and Latin & Greek Word Roots. For example, laughter, children, courageous. Otomatepia which are multiple phonemes which make a word, which is a sound. For example, rumble, boom and bop.
Finally, features a problem and solution which will assist students with not only very familiar content knowledge (everyone has had a first day at school) but also allows readers to follow the characters throughout the story in order to comprehend the deeper meaning of the text. All in all both teacher and student will enjoy this text for many reasons.
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