Books About Race + Diversity for Kids
This year I’m committing to bringing more diversity into our lives because when I took stock of our social circles, toys, and books, everything was honestly more white than I had anticipated. If you’ve been following along for a while, you know my house has a lot of wooden, Montessori-style toys because I love that they encourage imaginative play and let’s face it, are able to withstand the wear and tear than the kiddos put them through. However, what I wasn’t considering was that by not introducing the kids to books or toys that featured people that were different from them, I was excluding topics of race and diversity from our home even if I didn’t intend to do so.
Where to buy books on diversity
If you’re going to shop books about diversity, anti-racism, and tolerance for your kids, I encourage you to first try your local bookstores, especially ones that may be Black or female owned. However, if you don’t have anything like that or if you aren’t comfortable with in-person shopping right now, there are some great, small businesses that you can order from online that totally fit the bill! I definitely recommend checking out Eye See Me, the biggest collection of African American books for kids in the US!
I have all of my anti-racism links (including bookstores) saved under an “Anti-Racism” highlight on Instagram - be sure to check it out for even more tools + resources.
Other retailers such as Target, Barnes & Noble, and Amazon have a huge variety of books about race, racism, and raising anti-racist kids.
Other online resources for discovering new reads
When you’re looking for information on books, what to read, and where to find them, there are some great accounts on Instagram that are curating books for kids of all ages. I really like that these accounts feature both stories that tackle tough subjects as well as stories that aren’t necessarily about race, but that do feature Black and Brown characters as the main character, hero of the story, etc. Both types of books are so important for helping to introduce white children to race. If you’re not sure where to start your reading list or even having conversations about race, give these accounts a follow:
Books on race + diversity available through Amazon
I started searching for kids books on Amazon while I was gathering other school supplies and was really excited to see just how many options there were. I tried to include books that feature a wide variety of cultures and skin colors as well as story lines.
One // The Sneetches and Other Stories // Two // Go Show the World: A Celebration of Indigenous Heroes // Three // He’s Got the Whole World in His Hands // Four // A Kids Book About Racism // Five // Amazing Grace // Six // Same, Same But Different // Seven // Skin Like Mine // Eight // The Color of Us // Nine // ColorFull: Celebrating the Colors God Gave Us // Ten // The Skin You Live In // Eleven // This Is How We Do It: One Day in the Lives of Seven Kids from around the World // Twelve // Separate Is Never Equal: Sylvia Mendez and Her Family's Fight for Desegregation // Thirteen // Little Leaders: Bold Women in Black History // Fourteen // The Case for Loving: The Fight for Interracial Marriage // Fifteen // The Name Jar // Sixteen // Young Gifted and Black: Meet 52 Black Heroes from Past and Present // Seventeen // We Are Grateful: Otsaliheliga // Eighteen // You, Me and Empathy: Teaching children about empathy, feelings, kindness, compassion, tolerance and recognising bullying behaviours
This is just a small start - there are so many amazing stories + authors out there and I can’t wait to discover more of them. Let me know what you’re reading, too!
