The Rag Coat

Written & Illustrated by Lauren Mills

Key Scriptures:
· Colossians 3:13 (ICB) "Do not be angry with each other, but forgive each other. If someone does wrong to you, then forgive him. Forgive each other because the Lord forgave you."
· Philippians 2:3-4 "Do nothing out of selfish ambition or vain conceit, but in humility consider others better than yourselves. Each of you should look not only to your own interests, but also to the interests of others."

This is a heartwarming story of a young girl's need for a new coat, the sacrifice of the women of her community to provide it, and her example of forgiveness of the children at school who taunt her. It was the first book that we stretched out over two weeks (because of grandparents visiting), and it worked out so well for us that we now usually "row" a book over a two week period.

We located the Appalachian mountains and checked out a map that showed where major coal deposits are located in the United States. We decided to put our story disk on West Virginia and made a WV "state envelope" for our geography envelope system. We also talked a little bit about "miner's cough" and black lung disease resulting from working in the coal mines.

We discussed forgiveness, using Colossians 3:13, and talked about why the "Joseph's Coat of Many Colors" pattern was particularly appropriate for this book. Throughout the first week we read several versions (of increasing length and detail) of the story of Joseph from various children's bible story books and discussed how Joseph's brothers acted out of jealousy, but also how Joseph demonstrated forgiveness towards his brothers, and how we are to be forgiving of those who hurt us.

We talked about various jumprope rhymes (including "24 Robbers" from the story) and tried jumping rope.

We read several other books related to quilts and noted how in many of them the fabrics used had "stories" behind them, just as the fabrics used in Minna's coat had stories behind them. We looked at some of the quilts that we own (made by Grandmother & Great-Grandmother) and related some of the "stories" behind some of the fabrics used. We also talked about what Heirlooms are.

Grandma Brauer helped us to select fabric from our scraps to make a "Joseph's Coat of Many Colors" wall hanging, using the pattern provided in the back of FIAR Volume 1. Grandma explained the piecing and stitching process and did the sewing on the actual quilt block, while also teaching Claire how to do simple stitching. Here is a picture of them with the finished wall hanging.

We also made a simple rag doll - probably even simpler than the one Minna played with in the book - as a part of learning about Appalachian culture.

During our second week with The Rag Coat we focused on Philippians 2:3-4 and looked at how the Quilting Mothers in the story put Minna's needs ahead of their own, and how Minna in turn also thought of others and not only herself. We read several more supplemental books (most relating to quilts) that also dealt with community spirit and giving of oneself for the benefit of others and the community as a whole. We also related this to Matthew 22:39 (one of Claire's memory verses) regarding loving our neighbors as ourselves.

We looked at various quilt patterns and saw the great diversity of pictures that could be made just from triangles and diamonds. We did some experimenting of our own with diamonds and triangular pieces of paper and made pictures of stars and boats utilizing these shapes. At a later date we'll explore this more using tangrams.

We reviewed what is meant by "setting" and "characters" and introduced the term "plot" while we were working on our journal entry for this book.

Here are some of the supplemental books we used:
The Quilt by Ann Jonas
The Keeping Quilt by Patricia Polacco
The Patchwork Quilt
Selina andThe Bear Paw Quilt
Grandmother's Chair by Ann Herbert Scott
Sweet Clara and the Freedom Quilt
Raising Yoder's Barn by Jane Yolen
Sam Johnson and the Blue Ribbon Quilt
Cranberry Autumn by Wende and Harry Devlin