1/24/18- Multicultural Children's Book Day

So, one of the cool things about being a part of the Kid Lit (Children's Literature) community is that occasionally I get free books.  Sometimes I win the books, sometimes I swap books with fellow authors, and then sometimes I get books to review as part of raising awareness for an awesome cause.  One such awesome cause is Multicultural Children's Book Day, which will be January 27 this year. 

Multicultural Children’s Book Day 2018 (1/27/18) is in its 5^th year and was founded by Valarie Budayr from Jump Into A Book and Mia Wenjen from PragmaticMom. Their mission is to raise awareness of the ongoing need to include kids’ books that celebrate diversity in home and school bookshelves while also working diligently to get more of these types of books into the hands of young readers, parents and educators.  

As a female engineer, supporting diversity in my profession is close to my heart and supporting diversity in children's book is an extension of that.  It's why I'm excited to be participating in MCBD and to have received books from Real MVP Kids that feature children from all kinds of cultural backgrounds.  The books in the Real MVP Kids catalog are the perfect books for reading on MCBD with your children.

About the books:

I received 5 books from Real MVP Kids to review for MCBD: Celebrate! Our Difference, Celebrate! The Way I'm Made, Celebrate! Bedtime, Celebrate! Mommies and Daddies, and Celebrate! Grandmas and Grandpas.  

Celebrate! Our Differences guides children in becoming friends with others who are different than themselves, realizing that “we’re more alike than different” while celebrating those things which make an individual unique.  Celebrate! The Way I’m Made helps children appreciate their own unique qualities, from physical traits to skills and strengths, affirming that they are good.  

Celebrate! Bedtime walks through a comforting bedtime routine while teaching gratefulness, obedience and calming strategies and features each of the MVP Kids families saying “goodnight” in their heritage language.  Celebrate! Mommies and Daddies strengthens parent-child bonds as children describe the ways their parent(s) love and care for them.  The MVP Kids families express “I love you” in their heritage languages.   In Celebrate! Grandmas and Grandpas, grandparents help children apply proverbs and cultural wise sayings to everyday situations, teaching young people to value elders and encouraging grandparents to strengthen their bonds with the younger generation.

Here's a link to MVP Kids and the books: https://realmvpkids.com/series/celebrate/

Review of books: 
All five books are great to read with toddlers (and babies and older kids too!).  Jack, my toddler, enjoyed reading them with me, but his favorite book (of the series) seemed to be Celebrate! The Way I’m Made.  He liked the rhyme of that book the best and enjoyed pointing out the different body parts when I'd read them (eyes! hair! hands!).  He also really liked the illustration of the kids and balloons on the cover, always asking for the balloons book.

Of course what I liked about the series was a little different from what my toddler preferred.  The themes in each book are familiar, like body positive in Celebrate! The Way I’m Made, and comforting, like the love of parents in  Celebrate! Mommies and Daddies, making the stories good to share with young children.  But what make these books stand out from other books that  have similar themes is the cast of children-- every illustration in the books has children of different colors, genders, ethnicity, and shapes and sizes.  A child should be able to self-identify with at least one character in the series, which is important to me as a female engineer and mother.   The illustrations are colorful and pleasant, invoking the celebration in each book.  There is also "Helpful Teaching Tips" at the end of each book that will help parents/guardians and educators in navigating difficult subjects, like low self-esteem (related to the body positive theme in Celebrate! The Way I’m Made).  

Using the Goodreads, Amazon, B+N, etc. 5 star review format, I give these books 4 out of 5 stars.  These books will not only be the perfect read for MCBD, but for any time you want to talk about diversity, love, positive body image, multicultural awareness, and so on.  Happy reading everyone! 

Now for some FREE stuff!

TWITTER PARTY Sponsored by Scholastic Book Clubs: MCBD’s super-popular (and crazy-fun) annual Twitter Party will be held 1/27/18 at 9:00pm.

Join the conversation and win one of 12-5 book bundles and one Grand Prize Book Bundle (12 books) that will be given away at the party!
http://multiculturalchildrensbookday.com/twitter-party-great-conversations-fun-prizes-chance-readyourworld-1-27-18/

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.

And now a thank you to sponsors!

Current Sponsors:  MCBD 2018 is honored to have some amazing Sponsors on board.

2018 MCBD Medallion Sponsors

HONORARY: Children’s Book Council, Junior Library Guild

PLATINUM:Scholastic Book Clubs

GOLD:Audrey Press, Candlewick Press, Loving Lion Books, Second Story Press, Star Bright Books, Worldwide Buddies

SILVER:Capstone Publishing, Author Charlotte Riggle, Child’s Play USA, KidLit TV, Pack-n-Go Girls, Plum Street Press

BRONZE: Barefoot Books, Carole P. Roman, Charlesbridge Publishing, Dr. Crystal Bowe, Gokul! World, Green Kids Club, Gwen Jackson, Jacqueline Woodson, Juan J. Guerra, Language Lizard, Lee & Low Books, RhymeTime Storybooks, Sanya Whittaker Gragg, TimTimTom Books, WaterBrook & Multnomah, Wisdom Tales Press

2018 Author Sponsors

Honorary Author Sponsors: Author/Illustrator Aram Kim and Author/Illustrator Juana Medina

Author Janet Balletta, Author Susan Bernardo,  Author Carmen Bernier-Grand, Author Tasheba Berry-McLaren and Space2Launch, Bollywood Groove Books, Author Anne Broyles,  Author Kathleen Burkinshaw, Author Eugenia Chu, Author Lesa Cline-Ransome, Author Medeia Cohan and Shade 7 Publishing, Desi Babies, Author Dani Dixon and Tumble Creek Press, Author Judy Dodge Cummings, Author D.G. Driver, Author Nicole Fenner and Sister Girl Publishing, Debbi Michiko Florence, Author Josh Funk, Author Maria Gianferrari, Author Daphnie Glenn, Globe Smart Kids, Author Kimberly Gordon Biddle, Author Quentin Holmes, Author Esther Iverem, Jennifer Joseph: Alphabet Oddities, Author Kizzie Jones, Author Faith L Justice , Author P.J. LaRue and MysticPrincesses.com, Author Karen Leggett Abouraya, Author Sylvia Liu, Author Sherri Maret, Author Melissa Martin Ph.D., Author Lesli Mitchell, Pinky Mukhi and We Are One, Author Miranda Paul, Author Carlotta Penn, Real Dads Read, Greg Ransom, Author Sandra L. Richards, RealMVPKids Author Andrea Scott, Alva Sachs and Three Wishes Publishing, Shelly Bean the Sports Queen,  Author Sarah Stevenson, Author Gayle H. Swift Author Elsa Takaoka, Author Christine Taylor-Butler, Nicholette Thomas and  MFL Publishing  Author Andrea Y. Wang, Author Jane Whittingham  Author Natasha Yim

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.