Best picture books for kids including Caldecott and other award winning books for children.
Secret Code Book Club for Boys My seven-year-old son is in first grade but his closest friends are in second and third grades. It just worked out that way because he missed the cutoff so he’s among the older kids in his class. He can read but he needs help with chapter books and when…
The words for Week 10 are from the picture book, New Shoes for Sylvia by Johanna Hurwitz, illustrated by Jerry Pinkney. To think that reading picture books will expose your child not only to a wonderful and gorgeously illustrated story, but to SAT building vocabulary. Jerry Pinkney is also a Caldecott winning illustrator and we are enjoying The Lion and the Mouse at home which is an amazing work that tells the story solely through watercolor illustrations with almost no words. This is not the case for New Shoes for Sylvia!
To say that Grace Lin speaks to the Asian American experience is probably not specific enough and, simultaneously, also much greater than that. As a sensei (sorry, I’m half Japanese and this means second generation in Japanese), Grace speaks poignantly of the pushes and pulls between her homeland and her “Americanization” conflicts that stem from trying to find the space where she fits in and yet connects with her ethnicity. I especially love Grace Lin’s Pacy series. The Year of the Dog is where Pacy discovers her career path in writing and illustrating books. The Year of the Rat has Pacy dealing with big changes coping from the loss of her best friend — the only other Asian American girl in her class who moves away to California. In real life, this happens to Grace as well, and this best friend turns out to be her future editor!
In honor of Martin Luther King, Junior, I have selected ten children’s and young adult books, both fiction and non-fiction, to help us all to understand exactly the magnitude of achievement that Martin Luther King, Jr. accomplished during his too short life. Happy Martin Luther King, Junior Day! And thank you to all the unsung heroes out there who stand up to injustice every day!
Please give a warm welcome to my librarian/blogger extraordinaire/Mom Friend The Fourth Musketeer! She graciously agreed to guest post on her her favorite books of 2011. I really, really wanted her list because she’s an expert in children’s and young adult historical fiction, and selfishly, I wanted this list for myself and my kids! We will work our way through it in 2012! How about you? What is your favorite historical fiction picture book, chapter book or young adult book?
Learning about our differences can be a powerful way for children to see from another person’s point of view. I encourage all parents to introduce some of these books or others like these to their children and use these stories as a reference when children bring up differences in school, particularly with special needs classmates. Because how great would it be if it were OUR child who can reach out like MacKenzie in The Friendship Puzzle?! The Friendship Puzzle and My Brother Charlie are a particularly powerful combination for anyone who has a sibling or classmate with autism and would be a great pair of books for any child starting kindergarten.
The Schneider Family Book Awards honor an author or illustrator for a book that embodies an artistic expression of the disability experience for child and adolescent audiences. I really like how these books let kids walk in the shoes of another and I find the themes of “trying to fit in versus accepting themselves and their family members” to be universal for all children.