As we're gearing up for another school year, I like many of you have been searching online for beginning of the year activities and read-alouds, thinking, "What should I keep from last year? What can I change to make the beginning of the year more successful for my students?"
Looking through all of the back-to-school read-alouds, I was struck by something I honestly should have noticed long before this...they are all written by white authors with primarily white characters. And I got to thinking, "Has the practice of beginning the year reading books depicting white students and authors given my students the impression that school success is for white students only? Have I (whether consciously or unconsciously) been telling my students of color that my classroom, and maybe school in general, isn't really for them?"
That's not to say that the books listed on the typical back-to-school read-aloud list aren't good books. Many of them are. I personally love First Day Jitters, The Recess Queen, Enemy Pie, and Spaghetti in a Hot Dog Bun. However, in the same way that high school literature teachers are looking to rethink the "classic" texts long thought of as required reading in order to include great literature written by women and authors of color (see #disrupt texts movement), shouldn't elementary school teachers also be rethinking what we consider to be "classic" read-alouds?
For myself, the answer is, of course, yes. I did a little digging online and in my local library and found some great beginning of the school year read-alouds featuring diverse characters brought to life by diverse authors. (One of my pet peeves is "diverse" literature written by middle class white Americans. Just because we went on a mission trip in a different country, grew up in a diverse neighborhood, or have a spouse/best friend/other family member of color does not qualify us to write from their point of view or tell their stories. Sorry.)
So, here are a few great stories that I will be adding to my repertoire of back-to-school read-alouds. I hope you'll find a few that speak to you. Diversity adds to all of our lives and opens us up to new experiences and different points of view that enrich our souls and help us better understand our fellow human beings.
Click on the pictures to find out more about each:
![The Day You Begin by [Woodson, Jacqueline]](https://images-na.ssl-images-amazon.com/images/I/61i-NgstdVL.jpg)
Enjoy!! And best wishes for a successful start to the new school year!!
Jacquie
