Multicultural Children’s Book Day 2019 (1/25/19) is in its 6^th year and was founded by Valarie Budayr from Jump Into A Book and Mia Wenjen from PragmaticMom. Our mission is to raise awareness of the ongoing need to include kids’ books that celebrate diversity in homes and school bookshelves while also working diligently to get more of these types of books into the hands of young readers, parents, and educators.

MCBD 2019 is honored to have the following Medallion Sponsors on board!

*View our 2019 Medallion Sponsors here: https://wp.me/P5tVud-
*View our 2019 MCBD Author Sponsors here: https://wp.me/P5tVud-2eN

Medallion Level Sponsors

Honorary: Children’s Book Council, The Junior Library Guild, TheConsciousKid.org.

Super Platinum: Make A Way Media

GOLD: Bharat Babies, Candlewick Press, Chickasaw Press, Juan Guerra and The Little Doctor / El doctorcito, KidLitTV,  Lerner Publishing Group, Plum Street Press,

SILVER: Capstone Publishing, Carole P. Roman, Author Charlotte Riggle, Huda Essa, The Pack-n-Go Girls,

BRONZE: Charlesbridge Publishing, Judy Dodge Cummings, Author Gwen Jackson, Kitaab World, Language Lizard – Bilingual & Multicultural Resources in 50+ Languages, Lee & Low Books, Miranda Paul and Baptiste Paul, Redfin, Author Gayle H. Swift,  T.A. Debonis-Monkey King’s Daughter, TimTimTom Books, Lin Thomas, Sleeping Bear Press/Dow Phumiruk, Vivian Kirkfield,

MCBD 2019 is honored to have the following Author Sponsors on board

Honorary: Julie Flett, Mehrdokht Amini,

Author Janet Balletta, Author Kathleen Burkinshaw, Author Josh Funk, Chitra Soundar, One Globe Kids – Friendship Stories, Sociosights Press and Almost a Minyan, Karen Leggett, Author Eugenia Chu, CultureGroove Books, Phelicia Lang and Me On The Page, L.L. Walters, Author Sarah Stevenson, Author Kimberly Gordon Biddle, Hayley Barrett, Sonia Panigrah, Author Carolyn Wilhelm, Alva Sachs and Dancing Dreidels, Author Susan Bernardo, Milind Makwana and A Day in the Life of a Hindu Kid, Tara Williams, Veronica Appleton, Author Crystal Bowe, Dr. Claudia May, Author/Illustrator Aram Kim, Author Sandra L. Richards, Erin Dealey, Author Sanya Whittaker Gragg, Author Elsa Takaoka, Evelyn Sanchez-Toledo, Anita Badhwar, Author Sylvia Liu, Feyi Fay Adventures, Author Ann Morris, Author Jacqueline Jules, CeCe & Roxy Books, Sandra Neil Wallace and Rich Wallace, LEUYEN PHAM, Padma Venkatraman, Patricia Newman and Lightswitch Learning, Shoumi Sen, Valerie Williams-Sanchez and Valorena Publishing, Traci Sorell, Shereen Rahming, Blythe Stanfel, Christina Matula, Julie Rubini, Paula Chase, Erin Twamley, Afsaneh Moradian, Lori DeMonia, Claudia Schwam, Terri Birnbaum/ RealGirls Revolution, Soulful Sydney, Queen Girls Publications, LLC

We’d like to also give a shout-out to MCBD’s impressive CoHost Team who not only hosts the book review link-up on celebration day, but who also works tirelessly to spread the word of this event. View our CoHosts HERE.

Co-Hosts and Global Co-Hosts

A Crafty Arab, Agatha Rodi Books, All Done Monkey, Barefoot Mommy, Biracial Bookworms, Books My Kids Read, Crafty Moms Share, Colours of Us, Discovering the World Through My Son’s Eyes, Descendant of Poseidon Reads, Educators Spin on it,  Growing Book by Book, Here Wee Read, Joy Sun Bear/ Shearin Lee, Jump Into a Book, Imagination Soup,Jenny Ward’s Class, Kid World Citizen, Kristi’s Book Nook, The Logonauts, Mama Smiles, Miss Panda Chinese, Multicultural Kid Blogs, Raising Race Conscious Children, Shoumi Sen, Spanish Playground

TWITTER PARTY Sponsored by Make A Way Media: MCBD’s super-popular (and crazy-fun) annual Twitter Party will be held 1/25/19 at 9:00pm.E.S.T. TONS of prizes and book bundles will be given away during the party. GO HERE for more details.

FREE RESOURCES From MCBD

Free Multicultural Books for Teachers: http://bit.ly/1kGZrta

Free Empathy Classroom Kit for Homeschoolers, Organizations, Librarians, and Educators: http://multiculturalchildrensbookday.com/teacher-classroom-empathy-kit/

Hashtag: Don’t forget to connect with us on social media and be sure and look for/use our official hashtag #ReadYourWorld.

I am delighted to participate once more in Children’s Multicultural Book Day as I have been involved in reviewing books since the inception of the event. This year, I had the pleasure of reviewing, Memphis, Martin, AND THE MOUNTAINTOP The Sanitation Strike of 1968, written by Alice Faye Duncan and illustrated by R. Gregory Christie.

This story is based on facts recorded in history books and the memories of a Memphis school teacher named Lorraine who was nine years old when the momentous events of 1968 transpired. Lorraine was the daughter of a maid and sanitation worker. At the beginning of 1968, her father’s wages were $1.70 a day. In January Robert and Cole Walker were killed in a sanitation truck accident. The all-black workforce organized a labor union, which the newly elected mayor, Henry Loeb, refused to recognize. Thirteen hundred men deserted their sanitation trucks on Feb. 12, 1968. The men picketed the streets for 65 days. A group of Memphis preachers formed a support group and used church donations to help the workers and their families. The NAACP organized boycotts and sang freedom songs. Martin Luther King, Jr. heard about the strike and promised to come to Memphis to support them. He preached that all labor has dignity.

On March 28, six thousand marchers gathered. The families stood behind the workers. Police had billy clubs, and tear gas. Within 15 minutes bricks and looting began. Rumors suggested militant teenagers initiated the riot. The mayor called in the National Guard. On April 3, Dr. King came to deliver his famous mountaintop speech. The next day, he was shot at the Lorraine Motel by James Earl Ray. His widow, Coretta Scott King, kept her husband’s pledge to march behind the workers. Protests sprung up all over the country.

President Lyndon Johnson sent James Reynolds to negotiate. The labor union was recognized, pay hikes negotiated and merit-based promotions instituted. The Memphis Sanitation Strike ended on April 16, 1968.

This picture book features bold, watercolor illustrations that evoke the mood and emotion of the event. It includes the powerful poem, that nine-year-old Lorraine wrote on the day of the march. A timeline presents the day by day history of the events, and Duncan adds links to the museum and a complete bibliography. The book is highly recommended as an insight into the emotions which rocked the entire country during the 1960s and a portrait of the economic and racial tensions that existed. Suggested as an effective classroom reference as a springboard to a discussion on civil rights history for middle-grade students ages eight through twelve. The author graciously provided a copy of this book for reviewers of this event.

If you enjoyed reading this post, please subscribe by clicking on the RSS FEED button or by hitting the Follow button in the upper right-hand corner of this post.

FREE lesson plans and a PowerPoint to use with students