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12 Favorite Picture Books about the American Revolution to Read Aloud

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This past fall my three children and I spent months immersed in the American Revolution. This was in large part due to the amazing number of fabulous children's picture books about the period. Every week I brought home armfuls of new books from the library. The following list represents the cream of the crop out of the dozens and dozens of picture books we read, the books most beloved by me and my three kids (10, 8, and 6-years-old). All were read aloud by me to my book-loving, squirmy, silly children on the sofa. Many of these picture books feature additional fascinating historical information in the endnotes. We often read aloud these pages as well!

Gordon Parks: Photojournalist of the Civil Rights Era (Resources for Artist Study)

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This past spring, we visited an exhibit of photographs by Gordon Parks. Gordon Parks was an African-American photographer who became prominent in U.S. documentary photojournalism in the 1940s through 1970s, particularly in issues of civil rights, poverty and African-Americans. I was especially excited about learning more about Parks because his photos are so rich with history, and we are a history-loving family! Parks, a self-taught photographer who was born into poverty and segregation in rural Kansas, created many iconic photos during the civil rights era. This artist study was one of my favorite experiences from our entire school year. I love studying an artist and then visiting their works in person. I actually went twice to the exhibit with two groups I organized: my son’s high school group and my daughter’s middle school group. During the second visit, we attended a talk by the curator of the exhibit. I loved hearing how she selected works from their collection to exhibit and her

Celebrating Hispanic Heritage Month with Picture Books

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Disclosure: This post may contain Amazon affiliate links. Your purchase via these links helps support my blog. Here are some of our favorite books to help your family celebrate Hispanic Heritage. Jose Luis Orozco My children grew up with a soundtrack of Pete Seeger, Ella Jenkins and Jose Luis Orozco. Books of Spanish n ursery rhymes and folk songs are how I introduced my babies and toddlers to Spanish at home. These books by Jose Luis Orozco are playfully and colorfully illustrated by Elisa Kleven and can be enjoyed on their own or in combination with the music (each book has an accompanying album - your library probably has the CDs). De Colores and Other Latin American Folksongs for Children (bilingual) Diez Deditos and Other Play Rhymes and Action Songs from Latin America (bilingual) Fiestas: A Year of Latin-American Songs and Celebrations (bilingual) Other Spanish folk songs and nursery rhymes Unless noted, these books all include the musical notation for the songs. Some f

Thomas Wiggins: the blind enslaved boy who became an international musical star

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Disclosure: This post may contain Amazon affiliate links. Your purchase via these links helps support my blog. Recently my kids and I learned about the musician Thomas Wiggins from a picture book I happened upon browsing the new books section of our recently reopened library:    

Favorite Picture Books about Native Americans

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Disclosure: This post may contain Amazon affiliate links. Your purchase via these links helps support my blog. Thank you. This past fall we listened to Bruchac's Children of the Longhouse about a 15th century Mohawk boy and Erdrich's Birchbark House series about an Ojibwe family living in the Lake Superior region in the mid-1800s. These audiobooks inspired us to take a deep dive into Native American peoples and cultures. We read dozens of picture books by and about Native Americans, most of them #ownvoices. These were our favorites.

Advent Countdown: Our Favorite Christmas Picture Books

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Disclosure: This post may contain Amazon affiliate links. Your purchase via these links helps support my blog. Each December we count down to Christmas by unwrapping and reading a beloved children's book about Christmas each night, some from the library and some from our own collection. Here are some of our favorites. 

Picture Books to Promote Social & Emotional Learning

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Disclosure: This post may contain Amazon affiliate links. Your purchase via these links helps support my blog. In addition to fostering in my children a love of books, proficiency with the written word, and familiarity with mathematical and scientific concepts, I would like to help my children develop social emotional skills, emotional intelligence, mindfulness or whatever you'd like to call it. But it can be tricky to figure out how to deliberately and explicitly talk to kids about these topics without it being forced and awkward. So I always have my eye out for a good picture book that will help my kids (and me) internalize some of these concepts and abilities. I love a good picture book that features or promotes: resilience emotional regulation anger management learning from failure coping with anxiety social skills optimism self-confidence growth mindset

Christina Rossetti - Poetry Picture Books

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Disclosure: This post may contain Amazon affiliate links. Your purchase via these links helps support my blog. We recently spent 6 weeks learning about and reading poetry by Christina Rossetti. Here were some of our favorite resources. Given how frequently you find Rossetti's poetry in children's poetry anthologies, I was surprised how difficult it was to find a compilation of her work that I liked. I ending up purchasing two books for our studies because neither of the library systems I frequent had any decent Rossetti poetry volume or biography.