Strengths And Weaknesses Of Maniac Magee

What were the strengths of the book?
Racism is not an easy subject and is often not discussed with young children, which makes one the strengths of Jerry Spinelli novel Maniac Magee is how well it handles the topic of racism. In the novel Maniac Magee, the main protagonist Jeffery Magee lives with his hateful aunt and uncle after losing his parents because of the recklessness of a drunk driver. Eventually he runs away from his unbearable home life and ends up in Two Mills where everything is white versus black. The town of Two Mills is strictly segregated and the black and white people living there do not across the invisible lines of racial division. Each side has its own racist ideas of the other side, and Jeffery “Maniac” Magee is caught in the middle. He knows people from both sides and as the story progresses even lives with both a white family and a black family. Maniac Magee did not care about the skin color of the people he befriends only the way they treat him. Not once in the novel did he treat anyone differently based on their skin color, which is an important lesson when talking about racism. By the end of the novel Magee is able to bring a few black and white people together. Another strength of the …show more content…
This book could be use has a stepping stone to help young children learn about a dark moment in American history without having to worry about whether the material is age appropriate because the book is for ages eight and up. This means children can start learning about segregation and maybe even the Civil Right Movement as early as third grade with this book to help lead the discussions. An activity that could be done is to have students write a short story about having to live in a town like Two Mills and meeting a kid like Maniac Magee. The story should be one page long and on the of the page have a drawn picture of the scene they