Little Friday Keys
With the help of a friend who is a fantastic child psychologist, I created Little Friday Keys: a list of qualities, skills, and traits that I will look for when selecting Little Friday Reads features. The list of keys is certainly not meant to represent every attribute (that would be a tome!) and we favored options that address core behaviors. The list will be updated over time, as needed. Right now, we have selected twenty terrific keys that work beautifully alone and together. I introduce them below, through five unforgettable characters that exemplify the heart of the keys’ intentions. Under those examples, I list them alphabetically, with definitions.
Winner of the Newberry Medal, Roll of Thunder Hear My Cry takes place in Mississippi during the worst part of the Great Depression. During a tumultuous and eventful year, nine-year-old Cassie Logan learns why her family fights to maintain control of their land as they are faced with the terrors of night riders and vigilantes, reminiscent of the Ku Klux Klan, and despicable social injustice.
Keys: Through Cassie’s narration, readers learn more about courage, civility, respect, and honesty.
In The Great Wall of Lucy Wu, readers meet Lucy, a sixth grader with great expectations for an epic school year. But before she can conquer the year, she finds out that her beloved grandmother’s sister, Yi Po, is coming to visit for several months and will be sharing a room with her. On top of a new roommate, she’s facing bullies who don’t want her to be the star of her school’s basketball team and a know-it-all, Talent Chang, at Chinese school. Will Lucy’s year be ruined?
Keys: Lucy’s warm story of silver linings is filled with humor and through her lens we learn about collaboration, friendship, and curiosity.
When Stars are Scattered is a beautiful graphic novel about childhood in the Dadaab refugee camp in Kenya. Omar Mohamed, a former Somali refugee, told his true story to Victoria Jamieson, the award-winning creator of Roller Girl. Without their parents, Omar has to take on the adult-sized task of caring for his younger brother Hassan, who is nonverbal and does not have access to medical care. Readers get a glimpse of how humanitarian crises impact children’s daily lives, choices, and opportunities.
Keys: Through Omar’s heartfelt story and journey, we can learn more about forgiveness, empathy, gratitude, and compassion.
True Grit is a classic period piece set in 1873. When Tom Chaney kills Mattie Ross’s father in Fort Smith, Arkansas, she is determined to get justice. At only fourteen-years-old, she enlists the help of Rooster Cogburn, a surly U.S. Marshal who is not initially keen to work with a young girl, to aid in her pursuit. Throughout their ordeals tracking Tom Chaney, Mattie has unwavering faith that they will succeed.
Keys: Mattie’s heroic adventure can teach us about adaptability, assertiveness, and resilience, along with the importance of having problem solving skills.
In Rainbow Weaver, readers meet Ixchel, a young Mayan girl in Guatemala. She wants to become a weaver like the women in her family, but they cannot teach her using the precious threads needed for the pieces they sell at the market. Those works of art are sold to pay for Ixchel’s school and books. Ixchel looks for other options and finds a solution that serves two purposes. By using colorful plastic bags, she can learn how to weave and get rid of plastic waste in the village.
Keys: With perseverance, patience, and humility, in an act of kindness, Ixchel finds a solution to her challenge.
Alphabetical List of Little Friday Keys with Definitions
Adaptability - capable of being or becoming adapted.
Assertiveness - disposed to or characterized by bold or confident statements and behavior.
Civility - a polite act or expression.
Collaboration - the work and activity of a number of persons who individually contribute toward the efficiency of the whole.
Compassion - sympathetic consciousness of others' distress together with a desire to alleviate it.
Courage - mental or moral strength to venture, persevere, and withstand danger, fear, or difficulty
Curiosity - desire to know.
Empathy - the action of understanding, being aware of, being sensitive to, and vicariously experiencing the feelings, thoughts, and experience of another of either the past or present without having the feelings, thoughts, and experience fully communicated in an objectively explicit manner.
Forgiveness - the act of forgiving; release from the guilt or penalty of an offense.
Friendship - the state of being friends; the quality or state of being friendly.
Gratitude - the state of being grateful; thankfulness; acknowledgment of having received something good from another.
Honesty - adherence to the facts; fairness and straightforwardness of conduct.
Humility - freedom from pride or arrogance : the quality or state of being humble.
Humor - the mental faculty of discovering, expressing, or appreciating the ludicrous or absurdly incongruous : the ability to be funny or to be amused by things that are funny.
Kindness - the quality of state of being kind; an act of kind assistance.
Patience - the capacity, habit, or fact of being patient; the capacity to endure what is difficult or disagreeable without complaining.
Perseverance - continued effort to do or achieve something despite difficulties, failure, or opposition; the action or condition or an instance of persevering. While slightly different, when it is more appropriate, we may use persistence instead.
Problem Solving - the process or act of finding a solution to a problem.
Resilience - an ability to recover from or adjust easily to misfortune or change.
Respect - an act of giving particular attention; to consider worthy of high regard; to refrain from interfering with.