Noah Wallace Students Perform Story of Nation's Evolution Toward Equality

At Noah Wallace School, students aren’t just learning about history, they’re also performing it. To coincide with Black History Month, Principal Diane Cloud decided to combine two things she loves – history and theater – by coordinating a play beginning with Rosa Parks’ famous bus ride and concluding with other historical figures who stood up for justice, equality and peace.

The play, entitled “The Courage to Stand Up” was written by  Cloud and Noah Wallace Librarian Maureen Gilroy for their fourth-graders. The play was adapted from the children’s book “If This Bus Could Talk” by Faith Ringgold, which the pair had read to their students. The students performed Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday for their peers and younger students.

The group of about 25 students donned costumes to portray a diversity of figures from Rosa Parks to Hillary Clinton. In their roles, the students told their audience it’s important to stand up for what is right, no matter how small the deed.

Performing history helps kids understand where the country has come from and also builds language skills, Cloud said.

"Theater promotes oral language development. It’s a good way to be expressive and it’s one of the arts. We don’t do too much with it,” the principal said.

Normally, for cultural events and celebrations, the school would hire outside groups to perform at the school. This time, Cloud thought, “we could enrich ourselves.”

Asked how she decides what to teach kids about segregation, Cloud said, “Third- and fourth-graders know there was a time that people couldn’t eat at the same place, use the same water fountain and they just look at me and say, ‘why not?’ We just teach them we’ve evolved as a nation and they don’t really understand slavery but it’s part of American history. You can’t talk about the Civil War unless you talk about slavery.”

Cloud has told her students Rosa Parks was in the right place at the right time and, because of the people she was surrounded by, the impact of her action had a powerful effect. But she still had to choose to take action.

“The bigger idea is that you have to learn to stand up,” Cloud said. “If you see something wrong, you need to stand up — you can’t let it just go by.”

The play afforded a variety of kids the opportunity to take part and as many as volunteered were included.

“I just added more boycotters,” she said. “Some of the kids were ones who haven’t volunteered before.”

The cast included Jenna Huntley and Katherine Weber as narrators, Mia Grzywinksi as Marcie, a fictional fourth-grader at Noah Wallace School, Grace Duncan as a young Rosa and Carolyn Piera as an adult Rosa. Ethan Grubelich played the bus driver and Holly Picchioni and Marin Quigley were the police officers.

Cyruz Tifa appeared as Martin Luther King to defend Rosa Parks, but after her story was concluded, others stood up from the bus and shared their stories. Camille Hobeb was Hillary Clinton, Kieran Mangla was Mohadma Ghandi, Maryam Moghul appeared as Wilma Mankiller, Dev Patel as Barack Obama, Grace Bergin as Aung San Suu Kyi and Yuriy Litvin as George Washington.

Victoria Jedrychowski, Mariela D’Alessandro, Shelby Lavoie, Lauren Young, Dayna Deakin, Mae Hickey, Victoria Augeri, Marin Quigley, Holly Picchioni, Natalia Gallagher, Lilia Giarnella and Katherine Weber were boycott marchers and chorus members. Many helped create the set.

In addition, Andre Keitt, an actor and storyteller from Hartford, gave the cast some direction with acting, staging and ideas. And, Cloud said, the kids were excited to work with a real actor.