Our Diversity Makes Us Stronger: Social Emotional Book for Kids about Diversity and Kindness (Children's Book for Boys and Girls) By: Elizabeth Cole

 

This book directly addressed diversity, teaching children the positivity of being different and embracing our individuality. The author uses a poetic structure in the book to express the characters' uniqueness regarding religion, gender roles, accents, feelings, family dynamics, and support. Although initially, the author presents the concern a character has bout wearing glasses and later embraces his unique glasses, I like that the author did not solely focus on the children's physical differences but also those of their personalities, beliefs, and interests. This introduces the idea to children that you can embrace and respect those who are different from you in various ways. This book has a great message, especially in its Thesis.

We Still Belong By: Christine Day

This book is about 12-year-old Wesley, an only child who lives in her grandfather's home, sharing rooms with her mother and living with her baby cousin and aunt. The book embraces diversity, bringing Wesley's story to light creates a presentation about Indigenous people in school. The book also embraces diversity, shedding light on what it's like living in a multigenerational household. This book introduces all the challenges Wesley faces and the relationship and diversity between her and her crush Ryan Thomas. This is a great read for children to be exposed to backgrounds outside of their own.

 

Last Stop on Market Street By: Matt de la Peña

 

The book reflects diversity in perspective and life circumstances. In the book, CJ travels with his grandmother to the soup kitchen on the public bus. While CJ feels bad for himself and looks at their circumstances of taking the bus and going to a soup kitchen negatively, his grandmother reminds him of the beauty in any situation. The book teaches children about having a positive outlook on their circumstances and appreciating people and things along the way. The book shows a diversity in the characters, their circumstances, and even their language. 

Wonder by R. J. Palacio

Wonder is a book that teaches our children diversity through understanding the perspective of children with deformities and disabilities and how they view the world around them. The book begins by talking about Auggie, a ten-year-old boy who was born with a deformity on his face. 

The author was able to present many prospects of their interactions with Auggie, how they each reacted when first meeting him, and how their relationships developed. The author also touched on Auggie's family, how they feel about Auggie, and their interactions with others. 

The book shows the perspective of Auggie and how he feels when meeting new people, and it also shows the perspective of other children meeting him for the first time, their reactions, and how his relationships develop. I loved that the theme of the book was to teach the impact of being a kind and good person and what it means to others.

Efrain Divided- Ernesto Cisneros

This book falls perfectly into my Blog's theme of embracing diversity and welcoming the reader into the life of an immigrant family and a first-generation American boy. The author described the diversity in Efren's school, community, and friendship with his best friend, David. In the book, Efren faces many adult challenges during this emotional, trying, and unstable time, forcing him to grow up. The author does an amazing job at descriptively introducing the reader to Efren’s life and tying this into the challenges he faces later in the book. Ernesto brought various elements to the story to draw in the reader. Ernesto carefully weeded details about Efren's life into the story to allow the reader to have a first person look at the experiences, fears and struggles many immigrants and first generation American’s face in today’s world. The book really brought an enlightenment to the reader of Mexico, their native struggles and even gave insight on various reasons and prospective on why immigrants move to America and several immigrant stories.  

Separate Is Never Equal: Sylvia Mendez and Her Family's Fight for Desegregation Author: Duncan Tonatiuh

This piece of literature is suited for children in grades 1-5. The book follows the theme of my blog of embracing differences, as the book teaches about fighting for desegregation. I liked that the book starts off by talking about how the main character, Sylvia, doesn't want to go to school with mean kids. But her mother reminds her of their fight to allow Sylvia to attend an integrated school. The book teaches children about many important struggles that segregated families endured, such as exclusion, poor conditions, fear of repercussions, degrading stereotypes, and bullying. I enjoyed the book's ending, which showed that many organizations of diverse backgrounds stood up to defend Sylvia's family and depicted that Sylvia could make friends of diverse backgrounds in school. Overall, the book teaches students about the fight it took to desegregate the schools they now attend and the fight it took for families to obtain that right. 

You Are (Not) Small By: Anna Kang Illustrated by: Christopher Weyant

 This piece of literature is perfect for younger preschool-aged children as it uses less dialogue and more imagery. It fits perfectly in my blog theme of embracing differences; in the case of this book, it is related to size. Initially, the text caught my attention with the title "You are (not) small" because it reminded me of my son. My son is the youngest in our home. Naturally, he is viewed as the smallest one in the house, and having the same name as his dad, he's referred to as the baby. Now that he is five and has a "big boy" mentality, he really dislikes being called "baby," "little," "small," or any name that emphasizes his size being less than anyone else's, even if it is factual.  I really enjoyed that the author is sending a message about sizes being objective.

Reading the book reminded me of the rebuttals my son has when he is called small, but the character of the big brown bear also reminded me of the Daddy Bear in Goldilocks and the Three Bears. The differentiation in size between characters also reminded me of The Goldilocks and the Three Bears, pointing out the size differentiation of Daddy, Mommy, and Baby Bear. Lastly, I really enjoyed that the author is sending a message about sizes being objective.