Great things are happening at Multicultural Children’s Book Day headquarters!
*Our Poster Reveal: The official MCBD2019 poster courtesy of author/illustrator, Julie Flett, is ready to take the world by storm! Needless to say, this poster’s beauty blew us away. Go here to read Julie’s story and download a copy for your reading area, library or classroom.
*2019 Sponsorships are OPEN. Go here to lock in your spot (deadline for Sponsor sign-up is 12/15/18). Pass the word! [Read more…]
Friends, we still have so much work to do!
Here’s some information from the CCBC about diversity in kidlit. In their analysis of picture books published in 2017:
* A character in a picture book was 4 times more likely to be a dinosaur than an American Indian child.
* A character in a picture book was 2 times more likely to be a rabbit than an Asian/Pacific or Asian/Pacific American child.
* A female character in a picture book was highly likely to be wearing pink and/or a bow, even if she is a hippopotamus, an ostrich, or a dinosaur.
* A child with a disability appeared in only 21 picture books, and only 2 of those were main characters. Most others appeared in background illustrations.
That’s less than one-third of one percent of picture books published in 2017 and received by the CCBC that had the main character with a disability. No wonder I have trouble finding books I want to review!
KitLit411 has an excellent list of resources and publishers that focus on diverse books for kids.
View out MCBD 2018 Author Sponsors and Medallion Level Sponsors to discover even more titles and diverse book publishers.
Thanks for being part of this movement to change these statistics.
ONE MORE THING
Get the scoop on a unique way to market your book or author HERE.
Sometimes the idea for a great diverse picture book for kids comes from the more genuine and authentic sources. That is exactly the case with Alex Asks About Auntie’s Airplane Day by Carolyn Wilhelm.
The idea for this book occurred to Carolyn when she saw her-2-year-old grandson watch his Auntie Betsy from South Korea, and seem to wonder how she fit in the otherwise white family.
Who knows what he was thinking, but it appeared to be he was noticing Auntie’s eyes and skin color. Carolyn decided this book could help him and other young children with older, adopted relatives, understand their families.
“This book is the story of one family’s airplane day party as seen through the eyes of the youngest nephew of the aunt who was adopted by a white family from Korea over 30 years ago,” Carolyn recalled. “Some people call such events gotcha day or adoption day celebrations. The twist is that the child is not the adopted person in the story.”
Alex Asks About Auntie’s Airplane Day: An Adoption Day Story by Carolyn Wilhelm and illustrator Pieter Els.
Alex Asks About Auntie’s Airplane Day is a multigenre fiction story based on a nonfiction annual event, the adoption day celebration sometimes called “airplane day” or “gotcha day.” This is the story of how an adult aunt adopted from South Korea fits in an otherwise white family in Minnesota in the United States. It is meant for the young family relatives to help them understand how a family could have racial diversity. Celebrations such as airplane day and gotcha day are a good way to help family members with such memories.
This sweet picture book is a great way to share the beauty and celebration of adoption while letting a student, friend or family member who has been involved with an international adoption see their story in the pages of a book. This book is also great for any parent or educators trying to help a young child to understand more about the wider world.
“If your classroom or story time group has children who live in multi-race families (perhaps because they are adopted), they wish to see and hear about themselves in stories,” Carolyn noted. “Although book publishers have more multicultural inclusion in recent years, it is still important for teachers and librarians to make a point to be sure and find books reflective of their students for read-aloud time.”
Another wonderful benefit of Alex Asks About Auntie’s Airplane Day is that it comes in three different reading formats; paperback, Kindle Paperwhite, eBook, and Kindle Fire interactive eBook. This book will appeal to kids in the Pre-K through Grade 2 age group.
Carolyn Wilhelm-Author and CEO of Wise Owl Factory
Carolyn has been a long-time supporter of MCBD and we appreciate her more than words can say. Her love of kids, books, and education are expressed in everything she does and she is one smart lady!
Carolyn Wilhelm has been writing mostly free lessons for teachers online since 1988. When blogging became popular about 2011, she began her own website and blog to share elementary education resources. She has had lessons published by the National Council of Teachers of English on their ReadWriteThink.org website. Prior to 2011, she used to have her free-lance lessons published by Good Apple and other teacher publications. She taught school for 28 years and found her students enjoyed the stories she wrote. Finally, she has begun writing and self-publishing children’s books.
When asked who her writing inspiration was in life, Carolyn had this to say; “My daughter is my biggest influencer as she is from South Korea and read books about mostly white children when she was growing up. This did not hinder her love of reading. She is an advocate of Multicultural Children’s Book Day and encourages my involvement each year. My husband has patiently proofread countless drafts and has been a writing mentor and supporter.”
Carolyn is a member of the National Council of Teachers of English (NCTE), which has published four of her lessons on ReadWriteThink.org. Her educational resources are for sale on Teachers Pay Teachers as well as Teacher’s Notebook. Previous publications include a story in an anthology Mom for the Holidays: Stories of Love, Laughter & Tantrums at Christmas & Hanukkah by Nolan and Demas.
She lives in Minnesota and enjoys time with her grandchildren, creating lessons, reading, and being involved in local community center activities. She loves taking time out in nature to observe her favorite bird, owls. She is Red Cross certified in pediatric through adult first aid and CPR.
Connect with Carolyn and Wise Owl Factory on Facebook, YouTube, Twitter and LinkedIn. Grab your copy of on Amazon.
Get the scoop on a unique way to market your book or author HERE.
It may be September, but planning for MCBD2018 is already in full swing!
There is MUCH to share and talk about-so many exciting new things in the works for this event and non-profit. AND we are still on an epic high from the results and success of our 2017 event. If you would like to see the full scoop, check out this in-depth blog post here, but our biggest point of pride is right here:
In 2017, Multicultural Children’s Book Day had 3.6 BILLION social media share impressions in three days (day before, day of, and day after). We trended #2 on Twitter during our Twitter Party (Jan 27 from 9-10pm) above #MuslimBan with 1900+ tweets during that hour. Our Twitter Party focused on the state of diversity in children’s book publishing and what readers were seeking and having trouble finding. [Read more…]
As with any event, success is measured by the strength and effectiveness of the team. At MCCBD Headquarters we are happy to report that we do indeed have a very strong team!
Multicultural Children’s Book Day is thankful for its CoHosts. Our CoHosts are a group of select powerhouse bloggers who share the same diversity in children’s literature passions and beliefs. They also assist in extending the reach and spreading the word of Multicultural Children’s Book Day. These 11 blogs will also be host to the wildly-popular book review/blog post link-up the week of 1/27/16. We would appreciate if you could take a few minutes and visit each of these excellent blogs. These women were selected by the MCCBD team because of their true dedication to supporting diversity in children’s literature.
[Read more…]
