Jackie Robinson: Strong Inside and Out (Time For Kids Biographies Series) Book

Used for Final

In this biography about Jackie Robinson, it begins in Georgia were his grandparents lived as slaves and follows his family as they move west in hopes of better lives. Jackie played football, baseball, basketball, and ran track while he was at UCLA, but eventually left to find a job. This was around the time of the Pearl Harbor bombing, so he joined the military. He eventually asked to be released from the military due to racial events. While he was looking for a job, he came across the Negro League baseball in Kansas City. He eventually gained the attention of Dodger's owner Branch Rickey who was looking for the right African American player to break the color barrier in Major League Baseball. Eventually Jackie would promise Rickey that he would not fight back for all the negative attention he would receive from fans and other teams while playing in the MLB. Jackie would go on to win Rookie of the Year in his first year in the big leagues and led the way for people of color to play in Major League Baseball.

This is a higher level read for elementary school students and will bring about more advanced topics and questions. I think it is important to discuss events like this and baseball is something easy to relate to and generate the conversation into more complex ideas. This book provides a lot of facts for students to read on their own if they were doing research on him or the sport.