King's Speech ... part three

This is the third in a four part post on work my students have been doing on Dr. King's I Have a Dream Speech. We discussed the Modern Civil Rights Movement from Black Codes to Booker T. Washington and W.E.B. Dubois to Selma.

Word Cloud of King's I Have a Dream Speech

The first step was to identify Key Words from their particular cutting. The students then worked in groups each class period to determine the key words for their group. I then collected words which had been on at least two of the three group lists. Those words were:

• Dignity
• Satisfied
• Justice

The students then were asked to summarize the speech using King's words.

The final task was crafting the speech in their own words. They were given the option to write a tweet, haiku or a 20-word notecard. This is what each group came up with:

Notecard
We must fight the fight to be discluded b/c of color of their skin. >>>>
Pplt ask us if we're happy. >>>>
We won't be :) until things are fair.

Tweet
Blacks :( havin' hard time, want freedom, whites^^ segregation 4 blacks has to go :) not equal, deserve legit unbiased life. #Free@Last

Haiku
We aren't going to hide
We will always with pride
Laws be justified

There were a couple individual ones which I thought were really cool too:

Tweet
We cannot let protest become physical violence. When we are asked, "When will you be happy?" We will never be happy until we have the same rights as the white man. #Free@Last

Tweet
While we try to stand alone, blacks are being treated terribly and we need to fight together for our rights and the for the kids. Everone deserves an equal chance. #Free@Last

The third cutting from the I Have a Dream speech:
I say to you today, my friends, so even though we face the difficulties of today and tomorrow, I still have a dream. It is a dream deeply rooted in the American dream. I have a dream that one day this nation will rise up and live out the true meaning of its creed: "We hold these truths to be self-evident: that all men are created equal." I have a dream that one day on the red hills of Georgia the sons of former slaves and the sons of former slave owners will be able to sit down together at the table of brotherhood. I have a dream that one day even the state of Mississippi, a state sweltering with the heat of injustice, sweltering with the heat of oppression, will be transformed into an oasis of freedom and justice. I have a dream that my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin but by the content of their character. I have a dream today. I have a dream that one day, down in Alabama, with its vicious racists, with its governor having his lips dripping with the words of interposition and nullification; one day right there in Alabama, little black boys and black girls will be able to join hands with little white boys and white girls as sisters and brothers. I have a dream today.