About the Book:
HARD TO FIND BOOK, only a very limited number of
copies are still available.
Cootie Shots is an imaginative assortment of plays, songs and poems designed for young audiences from kindergarten through sixth grade. Created by Fringe Benefits in collaboration with over five hundred educators, administrators, therapists, theatre artists, youth and parents, Cootie Shots provides a fun and constructive way to promote tolerance and celebrate diversity by presenting role models of many different races, nationalities, cultures, classes, genders, sexual orientations, abilities, religions, ages and appearances. Cootie Shots provides children with an opportunity to see beyond "isms" and conveys the message that every man, woman and child deserves to be treated with respect.
In Cootie Shots, the works of better-known contributors such as Pulitzer Prize-winner Tony Kushner, Academy Award recipient Debra Chasnoff, MacArthur Fellowship recipient, Luis Alfaro, Alice Tuan, John Fleck, Nancy de los Santos, Billy Aronson, Kate Bornstein, John Belluso, Paula Weston Solano, Paul Selig and Mark Waldrop are interwoven with those of children, teachers, theatre artists and families. Cootie Shots is richly illustrated in full color with artwork generously donated by children and professional artists, including such luminaries as Keith Haring, Norman Rockwell, Andy Warhol and two-time Coretta Scott King Award-winning illustrator, James E. Ransome.
Cootie Shots asks children to acknowledge the bigotry and discrimination in their lives, while helping them to imagine and take responsibility for creating a world shaped by love and understanding. By using familiar circumstances, often generated by real-life experiences, these plays assist children in understanding the feelings of everyone affected by cruel words: those who speak them, their targets and their bystanders. By engaging directly with these performance pieces, children learn to express their feelings honestly and effectively. They learn to choose words that heal the hurt and bring people together.
The 54 Cootie Shots plays, songs and poems may be enjoyed and performed in homes, classrooms, and theatres and/or community and religious centers…in celebration of Martin Luther King, Junior Day, Dias de los Muertos, Passover, Ramadan, Graduation, Women's History, Disability Awareness and Gay and Lesbian Pride months, and more.
What people say:
"Having witnessed first hand the power of Cootie Shots with parents, teachers and children, I applaud this wonderfully entertaining and educational work." — Judith Iguina, Resource Teacher, Sharp Avenue Elementary School
"Cootie Shots is a truly life-affirming collection." — Olympia Dukakis
"The beauty and power of Cootie Shots is that it encourages young people and adults to consider a different kind of world in which each of us can be a hero or heroine who stands up to injustice in the way Rosa Parks did." — Rosa Furumoto, Assistant Professor Chicana/o Studies Department, California State University Northridge
"Cootie Shots is an American art trophy." — Linda Frye Burnham, Art in the Public Interest
"Cootie Shots sets children on a fun-filled journey to discover values and identities for the 21st century. I'm eager to share this collection with my five-year-old." — David Henry Hwang, playwright
About the Editor:
Norma Bowles is the Artistic Director of Fringe Benefits, Inc., which was founded in 1991 as a coalition of theatre artists dedicated to promotes the idea that every man, woman and child deserves to be treated with dignity and respect.