Crossword Puzzles - Emmanuels Dream (Schneider Winner) - Overcoming Disabilities

This crossword puzzle is based on the book Emmanuel’s Dream. It was announced in January 2016 that this book was the winner of the Schneider Family Book Award. It was written by a wonderful children’s author named Laurie Ann Thompson and is based on the real life story of Emmanuel Ofosu Yeboah. Emmanuel was born in Ghana, West Africa with only one leg. He endured a number of challenges in his life, both physical and emotional. But his strong and persistent will enabled him to overcome them and today he is an international champion for all those born with disabilities.

If you have a student in your classroom or school who was born with or has incurred disabilities, this is an excellent book to use in speaking to your students about this subject. The book was written primarily for children 4-8 years old, but can have meaning and impact for older students as well.

There are some words in the book for which I felt younger children may not know the meaning. As a result, I decided to develop a small crossword puzzle with the definition of some of these words. As clues, I use not only the definition of the word, but also the sentence from the book in which the word is used. The words used in the puzzle are: astounding, boarded, bustling, disabilities, lungs, persuaded, physical, respect, and useless.

There are two puzzles that you can use. The first gives only the clues for the puzzle. The second gives the clues, as described above, but also gives you the word list (which will make the puzzle a little easier for your students to solve). I have also included the answer grid.

The publisher of Emmanuel’s Dream – Random House – has made a donation to the charity “Emmanuel’s Dream.” In that spirit, I publish this crossword puzzle as a freebie. I hope that you and your students enjoy and learn from it. And I hope that they will always remember that “disability does not mean inability.”

Richard Emmons