Elementary | Middle | Young Adult | Adult | Organization & Articles

Resources and strategies for challenging stereotypes and teaching about African countries
This list is based on books reviewed and recommended by Africa Access. Visit their website for a detailed database with critiques of hundreds of children's books and texts on Africa. Also, check out their annual Children’s Africana Book Award.
An excellent reading for teachers and parents to discuss is I Didn't Know There Were Cities in Africa! (Teaching Tolerance, Fall 2008). Submitted by Teaching for Change in collaboration with Africa Access, this article critiques the stereotypes in popular children's books and films, helps educators reflect on their own classroom, and provides a list of recommended titles.
Learn about our criteria for selecting titles at Social Justice Books. Feedback on these lists and suggestions for additional titles are welcome.
Most of the books on these lists are linked for more information or purchase to Bookshop (an indie bookstore platform) and / or Powells.com (an independent, unionized bookstore). A small percentage from book sales through these links goes to Teaching for Change.
Titles with reviews on this site are noted with an asterisk (*).
Elementary
Africa Is Not a Country*
By Margy Burns Knight, Jim Knight, Anne Sibley O'Brien (Illustrator)
An African Christmas
By Obi Onyefulu
Babu's Song
By Stephanie Stuve-Bodeen, Aaron Boyd
Bintou's Braids
By Sylviane A. Diouf, Shane W. Evans (Illustrator)
Boundless Grace
By Mary Hoffman, Caroline Binch (Illustrator)
The Boy Who Harnessed the Wind*
By William Kamkwamba, Bryan Mealer, Elizabeth Zunon (Illustrator)
Bundle of Secrets: Savita Returns Home
By Mubina Hassanali Kirmani
Catch That Chicken!
By Atinuke and Angela Brooksbank (Illustrator)
The Day Gogo Went to Vote
By Elinor Batezat Sisulu, Sharon Wilson (Illustrator)
Desmond and the Very Mean Word
By Desmond Tutu, A. G. Ford (Illustrator)
Galimoto
By Karen Lynn Williams, Catherine Stock (Illustrator)
Grandma Comes to Stay
By Ifeoma Onyefulu
Hands Around the Library: Protecting Egypt's Treasured Books
By Susan L. Roth, Karen Leggett Abouraya
Mama Africa!: How Miriam Makeba Spread Hope with Her Song
By Kathryn Erskine, Charly Palmer (Illustrator)
Songs in the Shade of the Cashew and Coconut Trees
By Nathalie Soussana, Jean-Christophe Hoarau (Another primary creator), Judith Gueyfier (Illustrator)
When I Get Older: The Story Behind "Wavin' Flag"*
By K'Naan with Sol Guy, Rudy Gutierrez (Illustrator)
Africa Is My Home: A Child of the Amistad *
By Monica Edinger, Robert Byrd (Illustrator)
Between Sisters
By Adwoa Badoe
Crossing the Stream *
By Elizabeth-Irene Baitie
The Kidnapped Prince: The Life of Olaudah Equiano
By Ann Cameron
The Mzungu Boy
By Meja Mwangi
Once Upon a Time in Ghana: Traditional Ewe Stories Retold in English
By Anna Cottrell, Agbotadua Togbi Kumassah
Out of Bounds: Seven Stories of Conflict and Hope
By Beverley Naidoo
The Red Pencil
By Andrea Davis Pinkney
Sundiata: An Epic Of Old Mali
By D T Niane
When Stars Are Scattered
By Victoria Jamieson, Omar Mohamed, and Iman Geddy (Illustrator)
Abina and the Important Men
By Trevor R. Getz, Liz Clarke
Americanah
By Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie
A Bigger Picture: My Fight to Bring a New African Voice to the Climate Crisis *
By Vanessa Nakate
Blue Gold
By Elizabeth Stewart, Martha Newbigging (Illustrator)
Burn My Heart
By Beverley Naidoo
Far from Home
By Na'ima B. Robert
Ghana Must Go
By Taiye Selasi
Half of a Yellow Sun
By Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie
King Shaka *
By Luke W. Molver
Mother to Mother
By Sindiwe Magona
Africa Counts: Number and Pattern in African Cultures
By Claudia Zaslavsky
Central Africans and Cultural Transformations in the American Diaspora
By Linda M. Heywood (Editor), Jan Vansina (Foreword by)
Mistaking Africa: Curiosities and Inventions of the American Mind
By Curtis A. Keim
Organizations and Articles
- Africa Access: Literature recommendations, student research projects, and a detailed database with critiques of hundreds of children's books and texts on Africa. Coordinates the annual Children’s Africana Book Award.
- African Studies K-12 Outreach Programs: University based programs which provide resources and professional development for teachers.
- H-AfrTeach: A discussion list which provides a forum on teaching about Africa at all educational levels.
- Masifunde Sonke Book Project: An education initiative of South Africa Partners promotes children’s literature from the new South Africa. For each book purchased in the United States, South Africa Partners donates a second copy of the same book to a rural or township school in South Africa.
- What Do We Want Children to Learn About Africa? This short article by Margy Burns Knight shares disturbing examples of how contemporary resources for children, including a National Geographic classroom poster, exotify Africans. The article includes the outline for a professional development activity.