Multicultural Books in the ClassroomMulticultural books share ideas, stories, and information about cultures, race, religion, language, and traditions. These books can be non-fiction but still written in a way that kids will find entertaining and informative. The main goals of multicultural literature are to increase sense of self-worth in students, achievement of educational equity, cultural pluralism, a sense of empowerment, the ability to work in harmony with other students, and teaching from a multicultural perspective. In using this particular type of literature in the classroom there are many benefits that can be taken from it.
|
Let's Look at Some Books!
Patricia Hegarty’s book about the bonds of family, illustrated by Ryan Wheatcroft, presents children with a variety of family situations, traditional nuclear families of different races, same-sex parents, grandparents raising a child, a single mother and child, multiracial families, to make the point that what they all have in common is love.
|
Vashti Harrison’s writes mini-biographies of 40 black females meant to be inspiring for all readers. Harrison says she wrote it for her younger self, wondering “what kind of dreams I might have had if I had known about all these women when I was growing up.” Harrison’s subjects range from Sojourner Truth and Harriet Tubman to Mahalia Jackson, Shirley Chisholm, Octavia Butler, and Dominique Dawes who are all role models in politics, sports, the arts and sciences, and more.
|
Written by Matt de la Peña and illustrated by Christian Robinson, Last Stop on Market Street shows children the value of generosity and being satisfied with what you have. Young CJ asks his grandmother questions on a bus ride—why don’t they have a car? why is one passenger blind? why do they get off in a dirty part of town?—as they travel from church to volunteer at a soup kitchen on Market Street. Her answers help CJ uncover the beauty in the world around him.
|