Use this activity to engage all types of learners, while requiring that they refer to and incorporate details from the text over the course of the activity.

“Letters to Amal’s Daughter”

In this activity, students will demonstrate their understanding of key characters and their attitudes toward the hijab by writing letters from these characters to Amal’s future daughter.

Does My Head Look Big in This? takes place in 2002. Imagine that in the years since, Amal has grown up and now has a daughter of her own, called Mariam. Mariam is trying to decide whether or not she wants to wear the hijab and, in the process, has asked for advice from her mother and three older women whom she trusts. Choose two of the four possible “advisors” and, from their perspectives, write letters to Mariam offering advice on this matter.

The four “advisors”:

• Amal
• Samantha
• Leila
• Yasmeen

Your letters should be one to two paragraphs each. They should clearly reflect the perspectives of the characters they are from.

Teaching Suggestion: Students can post their letters for their peers to read, either in the classroom or on a classroom website. As an opportunity for reflection, you might ask each student to find a letter that they think better embodies the perspective of one of the characters they themselves chose and then write a few sentences about what their peer did especially well and how they might change their own letter if given a chance to revise it.