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Here are titles on the environment for children, young adults, and educators. Learn about our criteria for selecting titles. 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.org (an indie bookstore platform) 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 (*).
Find lessons and additional resources for teaching about climate justice and the environment at the Zinn Education Project (coordinated by Teaching for Change and Rethinking Schools.)
Also see these related booklists:
Alicia and the Hurricane: A Story of Puerto Rico / Alicia y el huracán: Un cuento de Puerto Rico
By Leslea Newman, Elizabeth Erazo Baez (Illustrator), and Georgina Lazaro (Translator)
The Boy Who Harnessed the Wind*
By William Kamkwamba, Bryan Mealer, Elizabeth Zunon (Illustrator)
If We Were Gone: Imagining the World Without People
By John Coy and Natalie Capannelli (Illustrator)
Old Enough to Save the Planet
By Loll Kirby and Adelina Lirius (Illustrator)
Oil Spill!
By Melvin Berger and Paul Mirocha (Illustrator)
Rachel: The Story of Rachel Carson
By Amy Ehrlich, Wendell Minor (Illustrator)
Rainbow Weaver*
By Linda Elovitz Marshall, Elisa Chavarri (Illustrator)
The Story of the Blue Planet
By Andri Snaer Magnason, Aslaug Jonsdottir (Illustrator)
Heroes of the Environment: True Stories of People Who Are Helping to Protect Our Planet
By Harriet Rohmer, Julie McLaughlin (Illustrator)
How to Change Everything: The Young Human's Guide to Protecting the Planet and Each Other
By Naomi Klein and adapted by Rebecca Stefoff
Ninth Ward
By Jewell Parker Rhodes
The Omnivore's Dilemma: Young Readers Edition
By Michael Pollan
Poisoned Water: How the Citizens of Flint, Michigan, Fought for Their Lives and Warned the Nation *
By Candy J. Cooper with Marc Aronson
A Bigger Picture: My Fight to Bring a New African Voice to the Climate Crisis *
By Vanessa Nakate
Coal Mountain Elementary
By Mark Nowak, Ian Teh (Photographer)
Ghost Fishing: An Eco-Justice Poetry Anthology
By Melissa Tuckey (Editor), Camille Dungy (Foreword by)
How to Change Everything: The Young Human's Guide to Protecting the Planet and Each Other
By Naomi Klein and adapted by Rebecca Stefoff
Mean Spirit
By Linda Hogan
Mi María, Surviving the Storm: Voices from Puerto Rico
Edited by Ricia Anne Chansky and Marci Denesiuk
Parable of the Sower: A Graphic Novel Adaptation
By Octavia E. Butler, Damian Duffy (Adapted by), John Jennings (Illustrator)
Running
By Natalia Sylvester
The Water Defenders: How Ordinary People Saved a Country from Corporate Greed
By Robin Broad and John Cavanagh
Bright Green Lies: How the Environmental Movement Lost Its Way and What We Can Do about It
By Derrick Jensen, Lierre Keith, and Max Wilbert
Cowed: The Hidden Impact of 93 Million Cows on America's Health, Economy, Politics, Culture, and Environment
By Denis Hayes, Gail Boyer Hayes
Earth Democracy: Justice, Sustainability, and Peace
By Vandana Shiva
Living Downstream: A Scientist's Personal Investigation of Cancer and the Environment
By Sandra Steingraber
Sea of Storms: A History of Hurricanes in the Greater Caribbean from Columbus to Katrina
By Stuart B. Schwartz
A Terrible Thing to Waste: Environmental Racism and Its Assault on the American Mind
By Harriet A. Washington
The Vandana Shiva Reader
By Vandana Shiva
Waste: One Woman's Fight Against America's Dirty Secret
By Catherine Coleman Flowers
A People's Curriculum for the Earth Teaching about the Environmental Crisis
By Bill Bigelow (Editor), Tim Swinehart (Editor)
Rethinking Early Childhood Education
By Ann Pelo (Editor)
