The Year of Miss Agnes
The Year of Miss Agnes - Front Cover
My first non-picture book review and I’m so glad it’s for The Year of Miss Agnes by Kirkpatrick Hill. This book is on the list for Spring Family Book Club Lineup through Read Aloud Revival, which if you don’t know about Read Aloud Revival (RAR) you should take the time to visit the website and join up for the premium content. It’s well worth it!
The Year of Miss Agnes is historical fiction and it narrates, through the voice of Fred (short for Frederika), the story of school and village life among the Athabascans in Alaska during 1948. The main characters are Fred and Miss Agnes, the new teacher for their village.
“She was wearing pants. We never saw a woman wear pants.”
This is Fred’s first impression of Miss Agnes. Just from two sentences we know that this teacher will be different. Different good or different bad? That remains to be seen until about two paragraphs later. Miss Agnes, matter-of-factly, tells Fred and her friend Bertha to come in and help her unpack the teacher’s cabin. Within a few moments, Miss Agnes is already teaching the girls geography. They notice that she talks funny.
“That’s because I’m English,” she said.
This confused Fred because she spoke English too, but didn’t sound like the new teacher. Miss Agnes recognizes the confusion and brings out a “big book” with a map and shows the girls Alaska, where they are, and England, where she’s from.
This is basically how most of the teaching goes throughout the book. In a very natural, gentle way. However, we aren’t just learning what Fred and her friends learn. We also learn about the Athabascans. What they do as a family throughout the year, their language, their dress, their culture, and their small world growing as Miss Agnes teaches.
One example is through Bokko, Fred’s sister. She’s deaf and therefore has never attended school. Until Miss Agnes insists on it and shows Bokko along with the other children that even the deaf can speak. She begins to teach them sign language and for the first time, Bokko, is able to communicate to others. Her shyness begins to melt away. A beautiful moment that portrays this growing world and a connection through words is one with Bokko, Fred, and their mother (who wasn’t too happy to have both her daughters at school):
“Then she made the sign for Mamma, her thumb under her chin.
‘That means ‘Mamma,’ I said.
Then Bokko smiled that smile she got from our daddy, and she made the sign for pretty.
‘That means you are pretty, Mamma,’ I said.
Mamma’s face went so stiff for a minute that I felt nervous. And then she ducked her head away and went on her sewing.”
Can you imagine the overlapping of emotions from Mamma in this scene? Your child can finally speak to you…only you have no idea what they’re saying? Don’t fret, Mamma begins to learn sign language. The whole village actually learns sign language!
I could go on and on about all the wonderful moments of teaching and learning within this book, but that would be an incredibly long post. I’ll just say if you ever had a favorite teacher that changed your life then this is a book to read. If you homeschool and value the “feast” - as we Charlotte Mason-ers say - then you should read this book.
The Year of Miss Agnes is well-written. It doesn’t speak down to children, especially when the main character is a 10-year old, and it would be great as a read aloud or even to let your child read on their own. I think for homeschool children they would resonate with how Miss Agnes teaches, again, very natural, gentle, almost question-driven. For parents, there will be definite moments of nostalgia.
I love how Hill doesn’t make Miss Agnes’ teaching as the “right way”. It’s just a way and it enhances the already very rich life of the children, which then pours over onto the adults. Hill doesn’t imply that the one way of life is better than the other. It’s not trying to override their way or her way. It merely exposes the children to things they might not have thought of before. They also use what they’ve learned in their traditions as when Fred and Bokko are able to count and add all the fish they catch during summer fish camp.
Kirkpatrick Hill does a wonderful job with her description and knowledge of the people of Alaska. It comes from first-hand experience as she was raised in Fairbanks, Alaska and spent over three decades of her teaching time in a multi-grade classrooms in the Alaskan “bush”. Hill writes a very real book. It’s not flashy with crazy “Alaskan” scenes like a bear chase, life-threatening dog-sled chase, or falling into cracked ice. It’s a simple book about real people doing their normal, every day life. And it’s so good! The book is full of new things to learn, clever from Fred’s point-of-view (offering children a voice), and Miss Agnes illustrates love, patience, kindness, and how working whole-heartedly changes those around you.
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