Social Justice Books

Critically reviewed selection of multicultural and social justice books for children, young adults, and educators.

The World Needs More Purple People

Reviewed by Paige Pagan Review Source: Teaching for Change Book Author: The World Needs More Purple People is designed to teach early elementary children that they should be inquisitive, humorous, kind, outspoken, diligent, and authentic, which are all essential qualities indeed and according to the protagonist, Penny, all needed to become a purple person. The […]

The Teachers March! How Selma’s Teachers Changed History

Reviewed by Jenice L. View Review Source: Teaching for Change Book Author: Overall, this book is very well researched and cited. It centers Black people, their strategic thinking, and their agency at a time when the national story of the Black freedom movement was being complicated by heightened white supremacist violence, rising resistance to the […]

Our Skin: A First Conversation About Race

Reviewed by Makai Kellogg Review Source: Teaching for Change Book Author: Our Skin: A First Conversation About Race is the book we’ve been waiting for! The team (Megan Madison, Jessica Ralli, and Isabel Roxas) did an incredible thing: they explained race and racism to young children. Not only did they do it in a few […]

The Voting Booth

Reviewed by Deborah Menkart Review Source: Teaching for Change Book Author: This novel for ages 12+ lives up to its dedication to Fannie Lou Hamer.  Two storylines sweep readers along — one about contemporary challenges of voting on election day and the other a budding love story. High school student protagonist Marva Sheridan has been […]

Kiyoshi’s Walk

Reviewed by Pat Corekin Review Source: Teaching for Change Book Author: “Where do poems come from?” young Kiyoshi asks his grandfather, Eto, and so begins a wonderful journey of poetic discovery. Eto takes Kiyoshi for a walk through their city. The smallest events — a cat knocking over oranges at the corner store, birds soaring […]

Violet the Snowgirl: A Story of Loss and Healing

Reviewed by: Pat Corekin Review source: Teaching for Change Book author: Two children, Jerzie and Josiah, spend a day building a snowgirl with their grandmother. As they construct their snowgirl, their imaginations create a number of adventure stories — Violet the Snowgirl is a pilot, an alien, a third grade teacher, a librarian, a veterinarian, […]