Celebrating Multicultural Children’s Book Day (MCBD 2019)

[ 0 ] 13/01/2019 | liza

This is my first year participating in the online event Multicultural Children’s Book Day as an author and book reviewer. I am honored to be part of this, helping to raise awareness for children’s books that celebrate diversity and inspire a love of learning. I received a digital copy of the illustrated children’s book ‘Amelie Gets Busy‘ for review purposes. The book is written by the talented author, foreign languages school owner and teacher Agatha Rodi, a global co-host of the event and the one who invited me to participate.

a) About the book ‘Amelie Gets Busy’ (picture book for pre-schoolers and early readers)

It’s the story of a young girl, Amelie, who gets to spend some time at her grandma’s farm, in what appears to be a typical village of the Greek countryside. It is the summer season, and during this time of the year the countryside is full of children and happy faces. It is very common for the children to get to spend sometime at their grandparents’ place during the school holidays while the parents are still working.

Amelie, as every other child in the world, lives in the now, she’s very impressionable and she finds that everything around her is full of wonder. Amelie bursts with excitement as she gets acquainted with all of the plants and birds and animals at her grandma’s, ”yiayia” in Greek, place. The hens, the chickens, the pigs, the bees and the ladybugs, the hedgehogs, the birds, the pomgrenate tree and the roses blooming in the garden.

Grandma cultivates her very own eggplants, tomatoes, green peppers and cucumbers. She also has fresh herbs like rosemary and basil and tons of flowers like carnations and bougainvilleas blooming in the garden. Amelie takes in the smells and the flavors, the colours and the sounds. All her sensations are heightened as she gets to experience something new all the time and she shares her excitement and delight with the reader. Her grandma treats her with some ice-cream and biscuit cake, the traditional spinach pie with the crispy dough and her favorite cherry jam.

Agatha Rodi with her short poems and descriptive language, and Joanna Scott with her soft and cute illustrations, adding just the right feel to the storyline, successfully give the young readers a glimpse of the Greek village life. I read it to my children and it brought memories of their own grandparents in Greece. I would recommend this book to anyone who wishes to bring back and reinforce memories of their child and their grandmother. Parts of the story are universal and I believe it will resonate with most children.

Here’s an extract, one of the book’s poems:

Yiayia’s gifts

In a keepsake box
There are my yiayia’s gifts
Full of village’s smells
Sugary sprinkled cookies and basil twigs.
Oh! A bunch of dry carnations and bougainvilleas
Lemon buds and orange leaves.

A jar of yiayia’s favorite cherry jam
Some pieces of spinach pie and feta cheese
Full of spices and crispy dough.
I always take my village with me,
The blue light and the hues of the rainbow
That make me say wow!
That’s why I’m so impressed!

b) Cooking activity inspired by ‘Amelie Gets Busy’

Cook a quick and easy spinach pie (spanakopita) with your little ones. Click here to watch the video and get the recipe

c) A traditional children’s song that talks about grandma’s garden + imagery and pictures with animals and scenes from the Greek countryside

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=96dyUb0CTJI

Click here to buy and download the ebook Amelie Gets Busy (Amazon Kindle)

Multicultural Children’s Book Day 2019 (1/25/19) is in its 6^th year and was founded by Valarie Budayr from Jump Into A Book and Mia Wenjen from PragmaticMom. Our mission is to raise awareness of the ongoing need to include kids’ books that celebrate diversity in homes and school bookshelves while also working diligently to get more of these types of books into the hands of young readers, parents, and educators.

MCBD 2019 is honored to have the following Medallion Sponsors on board

Medallion Level Sponsors Honorary: Children’s Book Council, The Junior Library Guild, TheConsciousKid.org. Super Platinum: Make A Way Media GOLD: Bharat Babies, Candlewick Press, Chickasaw Press, Juan Guerra and The Little Doctor / El doctorcito, KidLitTV, Lerner Publishing Group, Plum Street Press, SILVER: Capstone Publishing, Carole P. Roman, Author Charlotte Riggle, Huda Essa, The Pack-n-Go Girls, BRONZE: Charlesbridge Publishing, Judy Dodge Cummings, Author Gwen Jackson, Kitaab World, Language Lizard – Bilingual & Multicultural Resources in 50+ Languages, Lee & Low Books, Miranda Paul and Baptiste Paul,Redfin, Author Gayle H. Swift, T.A. Debonis-Monkey King’s Daughter, TimTimTom Books, Lin Thomas, Sleeping Bear Press/Dow Phumiruk, Vivian Kirkfield,

MCBD 2019 is honored to have the following Author Sponsors on board

Honorary: Julie Flett, Mehrdokht Amini, Author Janet Balletta, Author Kathleen Burkinshaw, Author Josh Funk, Chitra Soundar, One Globe Kids – Friendship Stories, Sociosights Press and Almost a Minyan, Karen Leggett, Author Eugenia Chu, CultureGroove Books, Phelicia Lang and Me On The Page, L.L. Walters, Author Sarah Stevenson, Author Kimberly Gordon Biddle, Hayley Barrett, Sonia Panigrah, Author Carolyn Wilhelm,Alva Sachs and Dancing Dreidels, Author Susan Bernardo, Milind Makwana andA Day in the Life of a Hindu Kid, Tara Williams, Veronica Appleton, Author Crystal Bowe, Dr. Claudia May, Author/Illustrator Aram Kim, Author Sandra L. Richards, Erin Dealey, Author Sanya Whittaker Gragg, Author Elsa Takaoka, Evelyn Sanchez-Toledo, Anita Badhwar, Author Sylvia Liu, Feyi Fay Adventures, Author Ann Morris, Author Jacqueline Jules, CeCe & Roxy Books, Sandra Neil Wallace and Rich Wallace, LEUYEN PHAM, Padma Venkatraman, Patricia Newman and Lightswitch Learning, Shoumi Sen, Valerie Williams-Sanchez and Valorena Publishing,Traci Sorell, Shereen Rahming, Blythe Stanfel, Christina Matula, Julie Rubini, Paula Chase, Erin Twamley, Afsaneh Moradian, Claudia Schwam, Lori DeMonia, Terri Birnbaum/ RealGirls Revolution, Soulful Sydney, Queen Girls Publications, LLC 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. Co-Hosts and Global Co-HostsA Crafty Arab, Agatha Rodi Books, All Done Monkey, Barefoot Mommy, Biracial Bookworms,Books My Kids Read, Crafty Moms Share, Colours of Us, Discovering the World Through My Son’s Eyes, Descendant of Poseidon Reads, Educators Spin on it, Growing Book by Book, Here Wee Read,Joy Sun Bear/ Shearin Lee, Jump Into a Book, Imagination Soup, Jenny Ward’s Class, Kid World Citizen, Kristi’s Book Nook, The Logonauts, Mama Smiles, Miss Panda Chinese, Multicultural Kid Blogs, Raising Race Conscious Children, Shoumi Sen, Spanish Playground

TWITTER PARTY Sponsored by Make A Way Media!

MCBD’s super-popular (and crazy-fun) annual Twitter Party will be held 1/25/19 at 9:00pm.E.S.T. TONS of prizes and book bundles will be given away during the party. GO HERE for more details.

FREE RESOURCES From MCBD Free Multicultural Books for Teachers: https://wp.me/P5tVud-1H 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.