I think I first heard about Multicultural Children's Book Day last winter, but I was too late to sign up as a book reviewer, so when I saw the posts on social media this fall I knew I had to jump in and be a part of this and signed up as fast as my fingers could type. I love books, and I'm constantly seeking out diverse books for myself to read and for the school library, so this was a natural fit. Based off of your grade level and preferences, they match you up with an author or publisher to send you a new multicultural children's book. Sandra Neil Wallace and Rich Wallace sent me the beautiful book below that was illustrated by Agata Nowikca and published by Little, Brown and Company in 2018. But before I dive into the book, I want to share a bit about Multicultural Children's Book Day. multicultural children's book dayFrom the MCBD folks directly: "Multicultural Children’s Book Day 2019 (1/25/19) is in its 6th year and was founded by Valarie Budayr from Jump Into A Book and Mia Wenjen from PragmaticMom. Our mission is to raise awareness of the ongoing need to include kids’ books that celebrate diversity in homes and school bookshelves while also working diligently to get more of these types of books into the hands of young readers, parents and educators." A lot of companies, organizations, publishers, and authors have helped them make this year's event happen. On the day of the Multicultural Children's Book Day, this Friday the 25th, they will also be hosting a Twitter Party @McChildsBookDay at 9 pm. I haven't participated in a Twitter party before, but it says they'll be chatting about diverse books and giving some away, so it definitely sounds like my kind of party. They have asked folks to register ahead of time for it (probably to make distributing the prizes easier would be my guest - asks for email, address, Twitter handle, etc.) - you can do that here. They also have a lot of free resources and book lists that I need to spend more time exploring. I'm always on the lookout for resources to help me continue to add diverse books to a middle school library's collection. First generation: 36 trailblazing immigrants and refugees who make america greatSandra Neil Wallace and Rich Wallace emailed me, signed this book, and sent it to me. I was so stoked when I got it! My school read Alan Gratz's Refugee for Global Read Aloud, I visited a local Indy refugee center with my school's equity team, and I'm constantly seeking out middle school books with diverse folks to add to the library's collection and read. This book was the perfect book for me to receive this year for MCDB 2019!
The note on the signed page from the authors said, "Time to celebrate The accomplishments of New Americans!" At first I took New to be calling out the fact that we tend to talk about the same Americans in conversations about our history (more often than not white males that passed away a long time ago if we're being completely honest with ourselves). But looking at it again now, perhaps it means New in the sense that these people were not always American. They were not born here, but they became citizens and accomplished a wide variety of extraordinary things. Either way, I couldn't agree more with that sentiment. They take a minute to define "first generation" and explain which definition fits this book. Then they have a lovely Introduction of which this was my favorite part: "They represent many races, ethnicities, and religions. They are men and women from tiny villages in Africa and crowded cities in Europe and Asian. They were born in countries ranging from Somalia to Germany, Syria to China. They are artists, chefs, activists, athletes, and scientists. Most of them faced discrimination while they created meaningful, impactful lives in the United States. But they never gave up, because they believed in themselves and in the best of America." Then the book dives right into the 36 trailblazers. The left side has a gorgeous, colorful illustration complete with a background relevant to that person. The right side has their name, a quote, and a one page of information that gives a little bit of background on that person including how they came to immigrate into America and what that person has done that has impacted others with some advice and other facts sprinkled in. At first I found the one pager of information about each person a bit lacking, because I wanted to know more about these people. But then I realized that's what should be happening in a book like this! It's not the job of a book like this to tell me each person's full life story; the book would be insanely long talking about 36 people in that much detail. This book's job is to expose people to a variety of heroes, open people's eyes a bit further, see ourselves or our aspirations in someone, and make us hungry for more information about them. I found myself researching multiple people, artworks, and more that were mentioned in the book while reading it. The former English teacher in me sees this as being a great piece when starting a biography unit. It could be used as model text or to find folks students may be interested in researching. There are also individual folks that could fit into other subject areas - they have people who are artists, scientists, mathematicians, athletes, activists, politicians, CEOs, etc. I really enjoyed the range of people they had. They had such a rich range of ethnicities, religions, career paths, time periods, genders, and more. Some of the people I was familiar with but it still shed new light on that person. For example, I did not know that Albert Einstein and his wife, Elsa, helped get other Jewish people out of Germany to escape the Nazis and wrote visa applications and helped launch the International Relief Association, which still exists today as the International REscue Committee. There were people I had not heard of but want to know more about or was very impressed by. After reading about Diana Al-Hadid, a sculptor, I immediately went online to look at examples of her large, complex, thought-provoking artwork and was blown away. It was especially inspiring to me personally to read about the people who saw a need and found a way to fill it such as Fatimah Hussein who enjoyed sports but noticed that Muslim girls were often not encouraged to play sports and could not easily participate in their clothing. Fatimah worked with the University of Minnesota, tailors, marketing folks, etc. and ended up starting Asiya, a company that has started up within the past few years to create and sell activewear including hijabs. Sandra writes in the back of the book about the inspiration behind the story and shares that one in six American adults was born in another country including herself and the illustrator. Then they have tips for kids to be a trailblazer, resources to learn more about immigrants and refugees, and a partial bibliography for students who want more information or resources on specific people. This is a definitely a book to have in a middle school library, and I think it'd even be a good fit for upper elementary. I could see it being in several classrooms and homes too. Selfishly, I'm going to keep this beautiful signed copy and read it to my children when they are a little bit older. But I'll also be ordering a copy for the school library.
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