Teachers who work with English as a Second Language learners will find ESL/ESOL/ELL/EFL reading/writing skill-building children's books, stories, activities, ideas, strategies to help PreK-3, 4-8, and 9-12 students learn to read.
A Changing World
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As explorers and settlers made their way from coast to coast, American Indians across the continent faced a dramatically changing world. With honesty, sensitivity, and even an occasional touch of humor, these books tell the stories of people living in uncertain times, challenged to preserve their way of life and inspired to seek friendship in unexpected places.
A Coyote Columbus Story
Product Description: Coyote rules her world, until a funny-looking stranger named Columbus (looking for humans to sell in Spain) changes her plans. Thomas King uses a bag of literary tricks to shatter the stereotypes surrounding Columbus's voyages, inviting children to laugh at the crazy antics of Coyote, who unwittingly allows Columbus to engineer the downfall of his human friends.
A River Lost
When the Grand Coulee Dam was built, the lives of the Arrow Lakes Tribe were changed forever. Sinee mat and her great-grandmother Toopa tell the story of life on the Columbia River before and after the dam. This important piece of Pacific Northwest history is beautifully illustrated by Virgil Smoker Marchand, a member of the Arrow Lakes Band of the Colville Confederated Tribes.
Adventures of Rabbit and Bear Paws: The Sugar Bush (vol. I)
This comic book is the first volume in a series set in 18th-century colonized North America and based on traditional teachings of the Anishinabek. We follow the story of two mischievous Ojibwe brothers as they play pranks and have amazing adventures using a traditional Ojibwe medicine that transforms them into animals for a short time. The authors include members of the Salteaux and Henvey Inlet First Nations. Additional volumes are available through the Rabbit and Bear Paws website.
Buffalo Song
For thousands of years, massive herds of buffalo roamed across much of North America, but by the 1870s, fewer than fifteen hundred animals remained. With reverent care, Walking Coyote and his family endeavored to bring back the buffalo herds, one magnificent creature at a time. Here is the inspiring story of the first efforts to save the buffalo, an animal sacred to Native Americans and a powerful symbol of the American West.
Crazy Horse's Vision
Product Description: Joseph Bruchac tells the compelling story of how a young boy named Curly seeks a vision in the hope of saving his people — and grows into the brave and fierce warrior Crazy Horse. Sioux artist S. D. Nelson's paintings, in the traditional ledger style of the Plains Indians, evokes the drama and the tragedy of this important American figure.
Crossing Bok Chitto: A Choctaw Tale of Friendship & Freedom
Dramatic, quiet, and warming, this is a story of friendship across cultures in 1800s Mississippi. While searching for blackberries, Martha Tom, a young Choctaw, breaks her village's rules against crossing the Bok Chitto. She meets and becomes friends with the slaves on the plantation on the other side of the river and later helps a family escape across it to freedom when they hear that the mother is to be sold. Tingle is a performing storyteller, and his text has the rhythm and grace of that oral tradition. — School Library Journal
Longwalker's Journey: A Novel of The Chocktaw Trail of Tears
Product Description: In 1831, ten-year-old Minko Ushi is part of the forced removal of his Choctaw people from their homeland in Mississippi to Indian Territory. Minko's father decides to travel ahead by foot, taking Minko and his beloved pony, Black Spot, with him. As he walks hundreds of miles across Arkansas Territory through howling snowstorms, Minko learns that his people are much like his stubborn little pony: They may suffer, but their spirit will never be broken.
Malian's Song
Young Malian lives contentedly in an Abenaki village near Montreal in the mid-eighteenth century. One night, Malian's life changes abruptly when her father carries her off to the woods and her village is attacked. Malian's story, based on the true story of "Rogers's Raid" in 1759 and passed down through Abenaki oral tradition, reveals that many Abenaki people survived the attack that destroyed their village, in direct contrast to Rogers' journal accounts. (Vermont Folklife Center Children's Book Series)
Morning Girl
A peaceful, tropical world is the setting for this simple yet rich glimpse into the lives of a young sister and brother. Morning Girl and Star Boy grapple with timeless, universal issues such as experiencing simultaneous anger and love toward family members and the quest to discover the true self. Not until the epilogue do readers discover that the story takes place in 1492 and that the strange-looking visitors Morning Girl welcomes to shore are not as harmless as they may appear.
The Arrow Over the Door
For young Samuel Russell, the summer of 1777 is a time of fear. The British Army is approaching, and the Indians in the area seem ready to attack. To Stands Straight, a young Abenaki Indian scouting for King George, Americans are dangerous enemies who threaten his family and home. When Stands Straight's party enters the Quaker Meetinghouse where Samuel worships, the two boys share an encounter that neither will ever forget. Told in alternating viewpoints, this chapter book is based on a true story.
The Game of Silence
Like its predecessor The Birchbark House, this long-awaited sequel is framed by catastrophe, but the core of the story, which is set in 1850, is white settlers' threats to the traditional Ojibwe way of life. Omakayas is now nine and living at her beautiful island home in Lake Superior. But whites want Ojibwe off the island: Where will they go? In addition to an abundance of details about life through the seasons, Erdrich deals with the wider meaning of family and Omakayas' coming-of-age on a vision quest. — Booklist
The Long Walk: The Forced Navajo Exile
Diné/Navajo historian Dr. Jennifer Nez Denetdale tells the story of the forced removal of the Navajos to Bosque Redondo, a reservation in eastern New Mexico. Collectively known as the Long Walk, the approximately 400-mile-long series of marches was endured by more than 8,000 men, women, and children. The text includes photographs, artwork, a timeline, and recommended resources.
The People Shall Continue
Product Description: In 1977, Children's Book Press published this groundbreaking book, which "was and is hailed as an honest history of colonization in North America." The epic story begins with Creation to the present day, telling of the struggles, endurance, and survival of American Indians.
This Land Is My Land
In his own words, paintings, and family photographs, acclaimed Native American artist George Littlechild takes young readers back in time to the first meeting between his Plains Cree ancestors and the first European settlers in North America. Through inspiring autobiographical stories accompanied by vivid, dramatic paintings, he recounts the history of his people and their relationship to the land, relating their struggles and triumphs with sensitivity, irony, and humor. Jane Addams Picture Book Award.
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