Feb. 9-13, 2026

Learning Targets/Agenda: (not necessarily in this order)

Students will read/preview ebooks on Epic.

Students will check out a book.

Students will listen to information and a story about Bessie Coleman.

Students will answer questions about the story.

Students will take an Accelerated Reader quiz for the story OR complete an activity on the story.

Brain Breaks (as needed): movement activities

This week we will learn about aviator Elizabeth "Bessie" Coleman, an African American woman that is called "Queen Bess" and "Brave Bessie".

Born January 26, 1892 in Atlanta, Texas. If she were still alive today, she would be 134 years old.

Because of discrimination, she was not allowed to enter aviation schools in the United States, but she didn't let that stop her. She learned French and enrolled in an aviation school in France. On June 15, 1921, she became the first American woman (of any race) to obtain an international pilot's licence.

She returned to the United States and put on aerial stunt shows, earning money to one day open her own flight school for African Americans in the United States. Throughout her career as a "barnstorming" pilot, she would only perform at air shows if the crowd was desegregated and allowed to enter through the same gates.

Bessie Coleman died April 30, 1926 at the age of 34 years old in Jacksonville, Florida, during a rehearsal for an aerial show. Her plan spun out of control, and she fell 2,000 feet to her death.

Despite her tragic fate, Coleman's legacy of flight still inspires others including the Tuskegee Airmen and NASA astronaut Dr. Mae Jemison, who carried Bessie Coleman's picture with her on her first mission into space when she became the first African American woman in space in 1992.