How Do I Fit It All In? Reflecting on Writing Beyond February 

“Dawnavyn, you can’t include everything.”

My editor said this to me during one of our meetings after I had finished the draft of one of the chapters in Beyond February: Teaching Black History Any Day, Every Day, and All Year Long. I was shocked that she realized I was trying to do just that. I wanted to explain every activity I ever did, cram in every resource I’d ever used to teach Black history, and list every book centering Black history on my shelf, but there was no way I could do that. In that moment, during that meeting, I had to decide which moments in my seven years of teaching Black history were the most important to write about. I had to put the most powerful, impactful, and practical examples and conversations from my classroom in this book. I thought that if this was going to be my only opportunity to share the importance and benefits of Black history in the elementary classroom, I had to be strategic. I had to be purposeful. I had to choose, which was very hard for me to do.

There was a list of features I knew I wanted to include when I began writing Beyond February. I wanted the cover to be inviting, I wanted charts, templates, and lots of pictures, but most importantly, I wanted my voice to be heard. One of my biggest fears is that people will not hear me and with this being a book detailing my journey as an elementary educator, I did not want it to sound like someone else wrote it. I did not want to use vocabulary words and sentence structures that did not sound like me. I would re-read passages multiple times to make sure that I could hear myself. I expressed this fear to my editor so she too was cautious about how my words were edited; I even wanted the captions in the figures to sound like I was describing to the reader what they were seeing. I’ve heard from readers of Beyond February that they felt like I was right there with them as they read through the chapters and I will always be grateful to my editor, Kassia Wedekind, for not only hearing me but guaranteeing that everyone else can hear me too!

A 5th-grade teacher invited me to her classroom to talk to her students about writing a few months ago. One 5th grader asked if I had ever thought about giving up while writing Beyond February. I was honest and shared that there was a moment when I felt stuck. I felt like there was nothing else for me to write, I had run out of words to describe this work of teaching Black history. I was also overwhelmed with ideas that I wanted to write about but wasn’t sure how to get it out. I did not directly share this feeling with my editor, but she could sense it. We decided to meet in Washington D.C. to do some research together and I would get some writing done while she edited. The National Museum for African American History and Culture is in D.C. and as much as I wanted to go, I knew that I was in D.C. to work, not to explore. Well, my editor surprised me with tickets to the museum and we went together. After being surrounded by so much Black history I regained inspiration and was encouraged to continue writing.

Beyond February was such a collaborative effort. Outside of the copy editor, and my editor, there were readers, an illustrator, an interior designer, a fact checker, and a historian who helped me along this journey. Having the fact checker and historian help me with clarifying the Black historical moments and people were my favorite comments to read and learn from. As much as I knew what I wanted to say and how I wanted to say it, the feedback from this community that was created was important to me and I considered all of their thoughts, ideas, and suggestions. Reflecting on this now makes me think about how we teach children about what it means to be a writer in elementary classrooms, and I think about how we make writing seem like a solo endeavor when it is truly community work. Though I could not include everything, as my editor told me, I included everything that I thought was important for elementary educators to know about teaching Black history.

Dawnavyn James is an early childhood, elementary, and Black history educator, emerging scholar, and Black history researcher who seeks to claim space for Black history in early childhood and elementary classrooms. She is the author of Beyond February: Teaching Black History Any Day, Every Day, and All Year Long, K-3 which centers her experiences teaching Black histories in elementary classrooms. Dawnavyn is currently pursuing her Ph.D. at the University at Buffalo and is a fellow at the Center for K-12 Black History and Racial Literacy Education. 

Giveaway Information

You can win a copy of Beyond February: Teaching Black History Any Day, Every Day, and All Year Long, K-3 by Dawnavyn James, donated by Routledge. To enter the giveaway, leave a comment about this post by Saturday, April 27 at 6:00 p.m. EDT. The winner will be randomly selected by Stacey Shubitz and announced at the bottom of the post by Thursday, May 2. You must have a U.S. mailing address and provide a valid e-mail address when you post your comment. If you win, Stacey will email you for your mailing address. We will choose a new winner if you do not respond with your mailing address within five days.

4/27 @ 8:50 p.m.: The giveaway is now closed.

Many thanks to everyone who left a comment. Mary from Madison’s commenter number was drawn, so she’ll win a copy of Beyond February.