
I was mom to a 3-year-old when the Sandy Hook shooting took place in December of 2012. I had just moved from NYC to suburban New Jersey, and the tragedy shook me to the core.
On December 23, it will be six years since the unlikely activist in me organized a candlelight vigil at our local duck pond. Sadly, since then, school shootings have not become an extinct species. Instead, my daughter is growing up in a strange world where active shooter drills are the norm, an America where children as young as nursery school are expected to hide in the corners of classrooms and in closets as they learn the protocol of lockdown drills.
As a parent, I often ask myself: What can I do to prepare my child for this strange world she has inherited? What impact will the experience of growing up in the shadow of mass shootings in schools have — not just on my own child, but on an entire generation of children in the years to come? And, as a creator of children’s media, I ask myself: Is there a meaningful resource that my studio can develop to strengthen this “Parkland generation” in the face of their new reality?
I have always believed that storytelling is a powerful tool for change and healing. As we approached the six year anniversary of Sandy Hook earlier this month, I was inspired by the #ArmMeWith hashtag that went viral in early 2018. Started by two teachers, it was a response to President Trump’s suggestion that teachers be armed with guns to protect their students. At Literary Safari, we decided to create an #ARMMEWITHBOOKS book list, as a companion resource to our graphic novella, William H.G. Butler Middle School.
We invited children’s authors to answer these questions: What is a must-read for children growing up in these challenging times of lockdown drills and mass shootings? What are books that can offer hope in these hard times?
The response to our call was resounding. Over 50 award-winning, diverse children’s authors, illustrators, and librarians participated and sent us extensive recommendations. In fact, it took us several months to cull through their picks to curate our final #ArmMeWithBooks list. Here they are.
Picture Book Recommendations
- Malala’s Magic Pencil by Malala Yousafzai
- The Carrot Seed by Ruth Krauss
- Not My Idea: A Book About Whiteness by Anastasia Higginbotham
- Maybe Something Beautiful: How Art Transformed a Neighborhood by F. Isabel Campoy (also available in Spanish)
- Farewell to Shady Glade by Bill Peet
- The Invisible Boy by Trudy Ludwig
- When a Bully is President: Truth and Creativity for Oppressive Times by Maya Christina Gonzalez
- Rotten Island by William Steig
- The Boy Who Didn’t Believe in Spring by Lucille Clifton
- We Came to America by Faith Ringgold
- Can I Touch Your Hair?: Poems of Race, Mistakes, and Friendship by Irene Latham and Charles Waters
- Three Balls of Wool (Can Change the World) by Henriqueta Cristina
- Officer Buckle and Gloria by Peggy Rathmann
- We March by Shane W. Evans
- The Rooster Who Would Not Be Quiet! by Carmen Agra Deedy (also available in Spanish)
- América is Her Name by Luis J. Rodriguez
- Pipsqueaks, Slowpokes, and Stinkers: Celebrating Animal Underdogs by Melissa Stewart
- When You Are Happy by Eileen Spinelli
- Barack Obama: Son of Promise, Child of Hope by Nikki Grimes
- Never Say a Mean Word Again: A Tale from Medieval Spain by Jacqueline Jules
- She Persisted Around the World: 13 Women Who Changed History by Chelsea Clinton
- I Dissent: Ruth Bader Ginsberg by Debbie Levy
- Dreamers by Yuyi Morales
Middle Grade Recommendations
- The Egypt Game by Zilpha Keatley Snyder
- The Way by Joseph Bruchac
- Ghost Boys by Jewell Parker Rhodes
- Zlateh the Goat by Isaac Bashevis Singer
- If You Come Softly by Jacqueline Woodson
- Inside Out and Back Again by Thanhha Lai
- Ahimsa by Supriya Kelkar
- A Long Walk to Water by Linda Sue Park
- And Nothing But the Truth by Avi
- Bud Not Buddy by Christopher Paul Curtis
- Esperanza Rising by Pam Muñoz Ryan
- Number the Stars by Lois Lowry
- We Rise, We Resist, We Raise Our Voices edited by Cheryl and Wade Hudson
- Where the Streets Had a Name by Randa Abdel-Fattah
- The Seventh Wish by Kate Messner
- Tell Me a Story by Amy Friedman
- Long Way Down by Jason Reynolds
- House of Purple Cedar by Tim Tingle
- Ask Me No Questions by Marina Budhos
- Getting Away with Murder by Chris Crowe
- Fist Stick Knife Gun by Geoffrey Canada
- Monster by Walter Dean Myers
- Schomburg: The Man Who Built a Library by Carole Boston-Weatherford
Young Adult Recommendations
- Loaded: A Disarming History of the Second Amendment by Roxanne Dunbar-Ortiz
- Give a Boy a Gun by Todd Strasser
- Ms. Marvel Vol. 1 by G. Willow Wilson
- All American Boys by Jason Reynolds and Brendan Kiely
- Shame the Stars by Guadalupe Garcia McCall
- If I Ever Get Out of Here by Eric Gansworth
- Piecing Me Together by Renee Watson
- I am Alfonso Jones by Tony Media
- Persepolis 1 and 2 by Marjane Satrapi
- On the Wings of Peace edited by Sheila Hamanaka
- Parable of the Sower by Octavia E. Butler
- The Poet X by Elizabeth Acevado
- #NeverAgain: A New Generation Draws the Line by David Hogg and Lauren Hogg
- To the Young Who Want to Die by Gwendolyn Brooks
- This is Where It Ends by Marieke Nijkamp
- Yummy: The Last Days of a Southside Shorty by Greg Neri
- Hope (speech) by Harvey Milk
- Tasting the Sky: A Palestinian Childhood by Ibtisam Barakat
- A Balcony on the Moon: Coming of Age in Palestine by Ibtisam Barakat
- The Beauty that Remains by Ashley Woodfolk
- The 57 Bus: A True Story of Two Teenagers and the Crime That Changed Their Lives by Dashka Slater
- Parrot in the Oven: Mi vida by Victor Martinez
- Violent Ends edited by Shaun David Hutchinson
- Grandpa Was a Cowboy and an Indian and Other Stories by Virginia Driving Hawk Sneve
- Watership Down by Richard Adams
- Period Power by Nadya Okamoto
- How I Resist by Maureen Johnson
- How It Went Down by Kekla Magoon
- Exit, Pursued by a Bear by E.K. Johnston
- March: Book One by John Lewis and Andrew Aydin
An Invitation
As we end 2018 — a year that has seen a particularly high number of gun violence incidents in American schools, I invite you to:
- use the #ArmMeWithBooks book list to help you build your home, school, or public library reading collections in 2019
- share this list with at least one of your favorite educators, librarians, or parents in your personal networks.
- add your recommendations or share this list on social media, using the hashtags #kidlit and #armmewithbooks (and tag us at @litsafarimedia )
Whether you are a parent, teacher, librarian, administrator, caregiver, or mentor — this list can help you arm the young people in your life with mirrors that reflect their fears and hopes, doorways to explore complex topics, and windows into real and imagined worlds that inspire resilience, empathy, and compassion.
You can download the complete #ArmMeWithBooks book list here. It features an original poem by Nikki Grimes, winner of the 2017 Children’s Literature Legacy Award, recommendations from over 50 diverse children’s authors including Newbery award-winners Katherine Applegate and Linda Sue Park, and notes from each of our participating authors on the reasons why they recommended specific titles.
Note: The concept of books as windows, mirrors, and sliding glass doors was originally articulated by Dr. Rudine Sims Bishop.
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