Introduce Grade 2 students to Maya Angelou, one of North America's most influential writers and leaders.
Read the biography, then try the questions. Every answer is in the text above them, so if you are not sure, go back and look rather than guessing. Some of these words are hard — that is what the explanations are for.
Poet, Author & Civil Rights Activist
Born: April 4, 1928 — St. Louis, Missouri
Maya Angelou was one of the most celebrated writers and poets in American history. Her powerful voice — in words, poetry, and song — gave millions of people the courage to tell their own stories.
Maya grew up in Stamps, Arkansas, in the segregated South. She faced enormous hardships as a child, including trauma that caused her to stop speaking for nearly five years. During that silence, she discovered the power of words by reading every book she could find.
As a young adult, she worked as a cook, dancer, actress, and journalist. She became deeply involved in the civil rights movement, working alongside both Martin Luther King Jr. and Malcolm X.
In 1969, she published ‘I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings,’ her first memoir. It became one of the most important books in American literature — honest, brave, and beautifully written, telling the story of her journey toward self-discovery.
She wrote more than 30 books. In 1993, she read her poem ‘On the Pulse of Morning’ at President Clinton’s inauguration. She received the Presidential Medal of Freedom from President Obama in 2011.
Where did Maya Angelou grow up?
What did she discover during the years she did not speak?
What was ‘I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings’?
What did she read at President Clinton’s inauguration in 1993?
Select every job the passage says Maya Angelou worked as a young adult, then press Check.
Click these in the order the passage tells them.