Answer: People students are learning about as part of Black History Month. These inventors, mathematicians, scientists, and key historical figures in the Civil Rights Movement are important Americans.

Each student in kindergarten researched and wrote a short report about different African-American who made significant contributions to our world. Reports included the students' original drawings of each person. These figures included Ruby Bridges, who was six years old when she was the first African-American to integrate an elementary school in the South; James West, who invented the foil-electret microphone used in most microphones, telephones and hearing aids; and Jean Michel Basquiat, a graffiti artist who rose to fame in the 1980s and had his art displayed in museums across the country.

Kindergarten also learned about Kente cloth, which is a brightly-colored fabric originally made by the Ashanti people of what is now Ghana. It was made for royalty but now worn by everyday people. Colors have different meanings. Students learned about the cloth through the book The Spider Weaver by Margaret Musgrove based on the legend of how the cloth came into being.

Second graders in Miss Taylor's class have spent each afternoon learning about important African-Americans. They read about the person and then summarize the person's contribution to a single sentence, which they memorize and recite each day. So far, they have learned about George Crum, Bessie Coleman, Katherine Johnson, Rosa Parks and Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.

Third graders also learned about famous African-Americans and created reports on their lives and achievements. These included Thurgood Marshall, Billie Holiday, Jesse Owens, Barack Obama and Bessie Coleman.

Black History Month