Multicultural Children's Book Day

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Sky-Diving to Success Through the Sliding Glass Doors of Picture Books

March 26, 2022 by Frances Evans

Women’s History Month is celebrated throughout the whole month and we are thrilled to share with you this guest post by author Vivian Kirkfield.

SKY-DIVING TO SUCCESS

THROUGH THE SLIDING GLASS DOORS OF PICTURE BOOKS

I had a lucky childhood.

I didn’t have to worry about food or shelter or safety. And growing up on the Lower East Side of New York City, I learned early on that people came in all shapes, sizes, and colors. I didn’t need books to introduce me to different cultures – I just played with the neighborhood kids – their family backgrounds spanned the globe. [Read more…]

Filed Under: Guest Posts, Multicultural Booklist, Spotlight on a Sponsor Tagged With: #ReadYourWorld, author promotion, Author Sponsors, Author Sponsorships, book marketing, book promotions, diverse book publishers, diverse books, Sponsored Post Program, Sponsorship Levels

Pack-n-Go Girls is Easing the Stress for Teachers & Distance Learners

October 1, 2020 by Valarie Budayr

{ Guest post from Pack-n-Go Girls}

Greetings! The Pack-n-Go Girls Team hopes that this post finds you and your loved ones healthy.

No matter where you are, the school year is going to be full of challenges. It doesn’t matter if you’re a student, teacher, librarian, or parent, school is being redefined, which creates its own level of stress for everyone.

Pack-n-Go Girls Adventures wants to help you ease the stress a bit and at the same time creatively engage young learners. Lisa Travis and Janelle Diller, Pack-n-Go Girls authors, are happy to do live interactive author visits via Zoom–for FREE! Their goal is to inspire kids to become curious readers, great writers, and global citizens.

Diverse Early Chapter Books for Girls

Diverse Early Chapter Books for Girls | Pack-n-Go Girls

Easing the Stress for Teachers & Distance Learners

Lisa and Janelle take young readers on a virtual author visit through the Pack-n-Go Girls countries of Mexico, Brazil, Australia, Thailand, and Austria. Lisa and Janelle share their writing secrets to make their writing come alive, and at the same time, they provide a glimpse of cultural similarities and differences, teach some language phrases, and quiz kids on fun facts.

At the end of the discussion, they’re happy to do a Q&A with your budding writers. The kids love it!

Are you homeschooling or not in a traditional classroom this fall? This offer applies to you, too. Gather eight or ten other homeschoolers and Pack-n-Go will gladly Zoom with them. Or if you don’t have a way to corral students for a specific time, feel free to share their YouTube video of the author visit. The YouTube video is 37 minutes. For live meetups, plan on about an hour–a few minutes more if you want to allow for questions. Most kids never get to talk to a real author, but when they do, it inspires them to read and write more.

Pack-n-Go Girls

Here’s a valuable tip: Pack-n-Go Girls authors aren’t alone in their willingness to do this. Most authors are only too happy to do a short Zoom conversation for free just for a chance to talk about their books and connect with readers. Contact your favorite authors through their websites or publishers.

Contact Pack-n-Go Girls at hello@packngogirls.com to get details for your author visit today! Let’s do some world travel from the comfort of your classroom!

Filed Under: diversity in children’s books, Events, Guest Posts, Spotlight on a Sponsor Tagged With: #ReadYourWorld, 2020 Medallion Level Sponsorships, Diverse Early Chapter Books for Girls, Guest Post, Pack-n-Go Girls®, Zoom author visits

Language Lizard: Inspiring Language Learners and Promoting Multiculturalism

May 31, 2020 by Valarie Budayr

MCBD has been blessed with an amazing connection and relationship with Language Lizard for several years. We are also honored they continue to be a reoccurring Medallion Level Sponsor for our Multicultural Children’s Book Day celebrations. This company always presents a high level of professionalism while providing much need products in a huge variety of languages. We are lucky to be able to continue to work with them and share their wisdom. Enjoy.

Inspiring Language Learners

“Bilingual is in my blood,” shared Anneke Forzani, company president and founder of Language Lizard; a woman-owned business that offers award-winning bilingual children’s products in over 50 languages. “My passion for bilingualism started when I was a child and that thread runs through all parts of my life. My parents immigrated from Belgium so the European lifestyle was part of my childhood. My father was also a college professor so I have fond memories of him inviting students who couldn’t go home for the holidays to our house. Our Thanksgiving table was often surrounded by a variety of languages and cultures.”

Forzani went on to share that this love of language stayed with her well into adulthood and was instrumental in the creation of her company, Language Lizard. The mission of the company is comprised of Two Pillars:

Pillar #1: To facilitate the celebration of diversity and multicultural education with bilingual (dual-language) children’s books, audio resources, multicultural posters, and culturally responsive teaching support. Language Lizard is also committed to supporting the academic and social development of English language learners while promoting the maintenance of home or heritage languages.

Pillar #2: To continually give back to the community.

“Language Lizard is pleased to support any companies that are interested in providing a unique charitable giving program to the communities in which they work, or to educational programs that they support,” Forzani noted. “We also participate in the Pledge 1% Program. It’s a global initiative that strives to change the world by inspiring early-stage corporate philanthropy. Pledge 1% is an easy way to leverage a portion of our future success to support nonprofits in our community. It’s a small commitment today that can make a huge impact tomorrow.”

Dual-language Children’s Books

The company supports dual language learners and promotes multicultural education and the maintenance of heritage languages by offering many products in hard-to-find languages like Hmong, Somali, Farsi, and many more.

Inspire kids to learn languages and understand diverse cultures
with our creative, award-winning multilingual products!

BOOKS: All of their books are dual-language (bilingual) and include English as well as the language you select. Each page (or facing page) contains both languages. Please click on any language below to find the products available in that language.

ALBANIAN
ARABIC
BENGALI
BULGARIAN
BURMESE
CHINESE
CROATIAN
CZECH
DARI
DUTCH
ENGLISH-ONLY
FARSI
FRENCH
GERMAN
GREEK
GUJARATI
HAITIAN-CREOLE
HEBREW
HINDI
HMONG
HUNGARIAN
IRISH
ITALIAN
JAPANESE
KAREN
KHMER
KOREAN
KURDISH
LATVIAN
LITHUANIAN
MALAY
MALAYALAM
MULTILINGUAL
NEPALI
NORWEGIAN
PANJABI/PUNJABI
PASHTO/PASHTU
PATOIS
POLISH
PORTUGUESE
ROMANIAN
RUSSIAN
SCOTTISH GAELIC
SHONA
SLOVAKIAN
SOMALI
SPANISH
SWAHILI
SWEDISH
TAGALOG
TAMIL
THAI
TIGRINYA
TURKISH
TWI
URDU
VIETNAMESE
WELSH
YORUBA

“The need to establish an awareness of and respect for other cultures in the next generation is clear,” Forzani shared. “We are living in a global community. In the US, over 20% of the population is either foreign-born or has a foreign-born parent. The Census Bureau estimates that by the end of the 21st century, minorities will represent more than half of the total population. In addition, with the expansion of the Internet and inexpensive international communications, the world is becoming increasingly interdependent.”

Expanding Minds and Worlds

With a constant eye on providing the tools and resources for adults as well as kids, Forzani and her team pooled their knowledge and expertise to create their wildly popular book Building Bridges with Bilingual Books and Multicultural Resources.  Published in 2019, this robust book is a practical manual of lesson plans, literacy games, and fun activities from around the world to celebrate diversity in the classroom and at home. This resource gives educators the tools to build culturally responsive classrooms that embrace multiculturalism.

Building Bridges with Bilingual Books and Multicultural Resources

Building Bridges with Bilingual Books and Multicultural Resources

“Our children must be comfortable working and playing with people of other backgrounds and ethnicities in order to succeed. As teachers and parents, we have a responsibility as well as a terrific opportunity to develop young people who are tolerant of other cultures and comfortable working in a diverse environment. We also have the ability to help children maintain existing home language skills and encourage parental involvement in education while at the same time promoting literacy and a love of reading. Language Lizard aims to give you the tools to do so.”

Exceptional Resources from Language Lizard

Their BLOG is filled with articles that support the education of dual-language children and promote literacy.

Parents, teachers, and librarians can also download free multicultural lesson plans that teach all students to appreciate and understand the diversity in our communities.

Fun Facts about Language Lizard

Language Lizard is a longtime sponsor of Multicultural Children’s Book Day and a current 2020 Platinum Sponsor.

The Company is located in Basking Ridge, NJ, and can be reached at 1-888-LLIZARD (888-554-9273) or info@LanguageLizard.com . For address information and to contact Language Lizard using their online form, click here.

Their products have been well-reviewed by critics, families, and teachers. Click here to read reviews and awards on specific products. Click here to read Testimonials by Language Lizard’s customers.

Language Lizard giveaway!

Language Lizard is excited to announce an epic giveaway to promote reading to celebrate 15 YEARS of supporting language learners!

Language Lizard giveaway

Win packages of bilingual books in over 50 languages! Extra winners selected during the pandemic. All entrants receive a free diversity lesson plan.

Enter for a chance to win throughout the year by doing 2 easy steps:
(1) Fill out and submit the giveaway form and (2) Sign up for our newsletter.

Sign up at www.LanguageLizard.com/win-bilingual-books

Filed Under: Author Visits, diversity in children’s books, Multicultural Booklist, Spotlight on a Sponsor, Teacher Tools Tagged With: bilingual books for children, Building Bridges with Bilingual Books and Multicultural Resources, Burmese language books, dual-language children's books, Farsi language books, foreign language for kids, Hindi language books, Hmong language books, Language Lizard, Language Lizard giveaway, Promoting Multiculturalism

Bilingual Personalized Children’s Books that Reflect Today’s Families

September 17, 2019 by Valarie Budayr

“If there’s a book that you want to read, but it hasn’t been written yet, then you must write it.”~Toni Morrison

That was the sentiment that author and mom, Jill Barletti, kept in mind when she took a leap of faith and created her flourishing publishing company, Snowflake Stories. “Just like a snowflake…every child’s story is unique,” has been the mantra and mission of her books; books that are created to be Bilingual Personalized Children’s Books.

Snowflake Stories

“I just didn’t wake up one day and decide to start a personalized book company,” Barletti shared. “It all began a few years ago when I was working as a translator, and I made the off-handed comment to my parents that I enjoyed writing posts for my blog more than I liked doing the actual translations. They responded by encouraging me to pursue writing, as I have always had strong writing skills. I agreed to give it some thought and began pondering what kind of book I might write.”

A few months later, as her extended family gathered for a reunion, Barletti experienced another “ah-HA” moment. At bedtime, her niece, Ava, and nephew, Aidan, requested a bedtime story. Not finding one that they were happy with, Barletti made up a tale about Prince Aidan and Princess Ava who fought the fire-breathing dragon. As the youngsters became more enthralled with the tale that included them in the storyline, Barletti I knew she had to write personalized children’s books.

Since that moment in 2013, this ambitious mompreneur, with help from her kids, has spent the past few years quietly building a line of award-winning, personalized children’s books that are a reflection of what today’s families truly look like.

With four books that can be highly customized in the Snowflake Stories catalog, parents, grandparents, caregivers, and educators are appreciating the uniqueness and relevancy of Snowflake’s line of bilingual personalized children’s books; books that help to reinforce that it shouldn’t matter if a child speaks Spanish or English, has brown eyes or blue, or has a single mom or two.

Bilingual personalized Children's books

Bilingual Personalized Children’s Books

“Initially, my mission was to write bilingual stories because I struggled to find books written in Spanish for my two half-Peruvian children when they were young,” Barletti recalled. “But we soon learned that it’s not just bilingual families who have to seek out books featuring families like their own — biracial, LGBTQ, single-parent, blended, adoptive, and multi-generational families do, too. And we realized that if we invested a little more time and effort, we could help lots of families find a few more books that look and sound like they do.”

The idea of creating customizable characters that reflected modern families became even more prevalent as Barletti researched other personalized book competitors. She noted that other personalized book companies relied on characters with raspberry-colored hair, disguises, and awkward angles to make the characters in their books relatable to more kids.

“To us, it was really important that young readers truly see themselves reflected on the pages of their custom storybook. To make this a reality, we worked closely with illustrator Jelena Brezovec in selecting a variety of skin colors, hair colors, hairstyles, eye colors, eye shapes, and a few other features for each character. Our books can feature other types of families often overlooked by traditional publishers – not just bilingual and single-parent families – but also biracial, LGBT, blended, and multi-generational families as well.”

Barletti also worked tirelessly to build a platform for parents, educators, and young readers that allowed them to select their book’s “cast” while tailoring the appearance of each character.

Customizing Books with Snowflake Stories

Bilingual personalized Children's books

► Choose your cast of characters:

1 special child + (up to) 5 loved ones

► Customize the appearance of each character:
Pick skin color, hairstyle, eye color & more

Bilingual personalized Children's books

► Select any 1 – 2 of 5 languages:
English, Spanish, Portuguese, French & Italian

Bilingual personalized Children's books

“The end result is books that look and sound just like your child!,” Barletti added. “I’m proud to say that each book is multi-award-winning; the books have won awards from the International Latino Book Awards, Foreword Review’s Foreword INDIES, the National Indie Excellence Awards, and the Moonbeam Children’s Book Awards.”

Bilingual personalized Children's books

The Inspiration for Snowflake Stories

When asked what the inspiration was for naming her growing company Snowflake Stories, Barletti had this to say;

“The funny thing is, none of us remembers who came up with the name Snowflake Stories! But we liked the alliteration. It was important that the name rolls off the tongue and just sound good. It also had to be memorable. We felt that Snowflake Stories checked both of those boxes. We also liked that the uniqueness of a snowflake reinforces the uniqueness of each book we create. We offer so many customization options that kids really can see themselves and their families in their book – even books for twins are different. And the tagline wrote itself: Just like a snowflake … every child’s story is unique!”

With four award-winning, personalized books, as well as forthcoming non-personalized books (adapted from their personalized books), Snowflake Stories has no plans to slow down anytime soon.

Books from Snowflake Stories Include:

Dance Recital  

The Big Soccer Game (for girls) 

The Big Soccer Game (for boys) 

At Bat 

Beautiful Ballerinas 

Bilingual personalized Children's books

The team at MCBD not only loves the fact that these diverse picture books will encourage kids to hone their love of reading, but also that these personalized books also become so much more than a story–they become a keepsake filled with valuable lessons that will stay with kids their whole life.

To learn more about Jill Barletti and Snowflake Stories, visit them on the web at https://www.snowflakestories.com/

Or Connect on Social Media: Twitter: @Snowflake_Story // @JillBarletti | Facebook: @SnowflakeStories | Instagram: @snowflakestories

Filed Under: Author Visits, Book review, Diverse Book Review, Multicultural Booklist, Spotlight on a Sponsor Tagged With: adoption book, Bilingual Personalized Children's Books, blended family picture books, LGBTQ picture books, Snowflake Stories

Smile Big, Dream Bigger | Author Andrea Scotts’s story

January 19, 2018 by Valarie Budayr

When Author Andrea Scott’s Sponsor Intake Form crossed my desk, it contained a story that I knew needed to be told.

Author Andrea Scott

Her company, Smile Big Dream Bigger, started off as a bilingual book to encourage people to smile big with their hearts and to dream big. It has formed in to a tutoring service for all age groups that helps people to learn different languages and excel in school, and it encourages them to make their dreams a reality. [Read more…]

Filed Under: Guest Posts, Spotlight on a Sponsor Tagged With: Author Andrea Scott

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