African-American adolescent girls who expressed little interest in literacy activities nevertheless enthusiastically engaged in reading and writing around a topic that mattered to them—doing hair—particularly when they were allowed to determine the format of the literacy activities. The program aimed to carve out free spaces for self-directed learning.
Pairing age-appropriate novels with thematic units on the civil rights movement and the presidential election allows one afterschool practitioner to bring democracy to life for inner-city middle school students.