Our collection of picture books featuring Black and Indigenous people and People of Color (BIPOC) is available to the public. *Inclusion of a title in the collection DOES NOT EQUAL a recommendation.* Click here for more on book evaluation.
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7 matching books
Show FiltersFriend on the Freedom River
"On a cold December night, Louis must decide whether to brave the treacherous Detroit River to take a slave family to freedom." -- publisher
Under the quilt of night
A young girl flees from the farm where she has been worked as a slave and uses the Underground Railroad to escape to freedom in the north. Award-winning duo Deborah Hopkinson and James E. Ransome combine their talents once more for this sequel to the best-selling Sweet Clara and the Freedom Quilt. Traveling late one night, a runaway slave girl spies a quilt hanging outside a house. The quilt's center is a striking deep blue -- a sign that the people inside are willing to help her escape. Can she bravely navaigate the complex world of the Underground Railroad and lead her family to freedom?
From far away
"When Saoussan immigrated with her family from war-torn Lebanon, she was only seven years old. This picture book tells the story of how she had to adjust to her new home in Canada. She describes the frustration of not understanding the teacher when she started school, not knowing how to ask to go to the bathroom, and being terrified of a prop skeleton. This is the perfect book to help kids empathize with immigrant children whose experiences are very similar to Saoussan's"--|cProvided by publisher
When I was eight
Based on the true story of Margaret Pokiak-Fenton, this book chronicles the unbreakable spirit of an Inuit girl while attending an Arctic residential school. Olemaun is eight and knows a lot of things. But she does not know how to read. Ignoring her father’s warnings, she travels far from her Arctic home to the outsiders’ school to learn. The nuns at the school call her Margaret. They cut off her long hair and force her to do menial chores, but she remains undaunted. Her tenacity draws the attention of a black-cloaked nun who tries to break her spirit at every turn. But the young girl is more determined than ever to learn how to read.
I am not a number
"A picture book based on a true story about a young First Nations girl who was sent to a residential school. When eight-year-old Irene is removed from her First Nations family to live in a residential school she is confused, frightened, and terribly homesick. She tries to remember who she is and where she came from despite the efforts of the nuns to force her to do otherwise. Based on the life of Jenny Kay Dupuis' own grandmother, I Am Not a Number brings a terrible part of Canada's history to light in a way that children can learn from and relate to"--|cProvide by publisher
A change of heart
A young African American and the son of sharecroppers, Lanier Phillips escapes the violence, racism and segregation of his Georgia home by joining the navy during the Second World War. But tragedy strikes the USS Truxtun one February night off the southeastern coast of Newfoundland, and Lanier is the lone black survivor of the terrible shipwreck. When he arrives onshore, the community's kindness and humanity bring him back to health and change his outlook on life. He went on to march for black rights with Martin Luther King and remained forever grateful to the small town of St. Lawrence, Newfoundland
The patchwork path
While her father leads her toward Canada and away from the plantation where they have been slaves, a young girl thinks of the quilt her mother used to teach her a code that will help guide them to freedom