Shaking Things Up: 14 Young Women Who Changed the World

Gr 3–6—Thirteen spreads profile 14 young women in history. The profiles are arranged chronologically and each has a poem and very brief prose biography on the right-hand side, with a full-bleed illustration on the left. Each spread uses a different poetic form and is illustrated by a different woman illustrator, including Isabel Roxas and Selina Alko. The portraits, which also incorporate a quote from the subject or a primary source, vary in their levels of dynamism, abstraction, and suitability to the person portrayed. Though the poems are all by Hood, they also vary in their success; the alphabet acrostic for librarian Pura Belpré is charming and makes sense, but limericks for Annette Kellerman seem to make her into a punch line. Many of the people profiled were among the first women or girls to accomplish something; however, the specific challenges faced by women and girls of color are only minimally discussed. The poems can perhaps be used to whet students' appetites for women's history before they delve more deeply into the lives and challenges of individual movers and shakers.