I've been busy compiling a list of books (chapter books, not picture books) that help capture the history, culture, or atmosphere of places around the world. These books range from very simple chapter books to books more appropriate for the young adult level. Fiction and non-fiction titles are represented, as well as a variety of historical eras.
I still have a list of books to research and add, so I'll let you know if I update this list.
Do you have favorites not on this list? Please leave recommendations in the comments! Do you have any cautions for books on this list? (I have not read them all.) Please let us know in the comments, as well.
North America:
Canada:
Owls in the Family (Farley Mowat), 1930
Alaska:
The Year of Miss Agnes (Kirkpatrick Hill), remote fishing village
Water Sky (Jean Craighead George)
Utah:
The Great Brain (John D. Fitzgerald), Catholic boys growing up in a Mormon community, 1890s
Montana/North Dakota:
Naya Nuki: Shoshoni Girl Who Ran (Kenneth Thomasma), Native American girl in 1800
Missouri:
The Great Turkey Walk (Kathleen Karr), Missouri to Colorado humorous Wild West, 1860
New York:
All of a Kind Family (Sydney Taylor), Jewish family in New York City, 1900
The Pushcart War (Jean Merrill), humor, 1960s
California:
Dragon’s Gate (Laurence Yep), Chinese railroad workers, 1860s
Bandit’s Moon (Sid Fleischman), gold rush
Esperanza Rising (Pam Munoz Ryan), Mexico/California, 1930s
Central America:
Guatemala:
The Most Beautiful Place in the World (Ann Cameron)
South America:
Argentina:
Chucaro: Wild Pony of the Pampa (Francis Calnay)
Peru:
Secret of the Andes (Ann Nolan Clark), modern Inca boy in the mountains
Europe:
Netherlands/Holland:
Hans Brinker/The Silver Skates (Mary Mapes Dodge), 1860s
Dirk’s Dog, Bello (Meindert DeJong)
The Wheel on the School (Meindert DeJong)
Dutch Color (Douglas M. Jones III), golden era of Dutch art 1600s
Sweden:
The Children of Noisy Village (Astrid Lindgren)
England:
The Shakespeare Stealer (Gary Blackwood), Shakespeare’s London, 1600
The Railway Children (Edith Nesbit), early 1900s
The Secret Garden (Frances Hodgson Burnett)
Ireland:
Nory Ryan’s Song (Patricia Reilly Giff), potato famine, 1840s
Spain:
The Shadow of a Bull (Maia Wojciechowska), bullfighting
I, Juan de Pareja (Elizabeth Borton de Trevino), art and slavery in 1600s
Switzerland:
Heidi (Johanna Spyri)
Treasures of the Snow (Patricia St. John)
France:
The Family Under the Bridge (Natalie Savage Carlson)
All Alone (Claire Huchet Bishop), French Alps
Twenty and Ten (Claire Huchet Bishop), WWII
Secret Letters From 0 to 10 (Susie Morgenstern), modern France
The Orange Trees of Versailles (Annie Pietri), late 17th century court of Louis XIV
The Invention of Hugo Cabret (Brian Selznick), Paris in the 1930s
Poland:
The Trumpeter of Krakow (Eric P. Kelly), 1400s
Hungary:
The Good Master (Kate Seredy)
Austria/Germany:
The Star of Kazan (Eva Ibbotson)
Russia:
The Night Journey (Kathryn Lasky), Jews escape Czarist Russia turn of century
Angel on the Square (Gloria Whelan), fall of Czar Nikolai 1913-18
The Impossible Journey (Gloria Whelan), Stalinist Russia circa 1934
Burying the Sun (Gloria Whelan), 1941, WWII
The Turning (Gloria Whelan), 1991/Yeltsin/Gorbachev
The Endless Steppe (Esther Hautzig)
Asia:
Japan:
Sadako and the Thousand Paper Cranes (Eleanor Coerr), WWI,I 1950s
Born in the Year of Courage (Emily Crofford), Japan/US, 1800s
The Samurai’s Tale (Erik Christian Haugaard), 1500s
Korea:
A Single Shard (Linda Sue Park), potters’ village, 1100s
The Kite Fighters (Linda Sue Park), Seoul, 1470s
China:
Li Lun, Lad of Courage (Carolyn Treffinger), fishing village
Little Pear (Eleanor Frances Lattimore), 1800s
The Kite Rider (Geraldine McCaughrean), Mongol-ruled China, 1200s
The House of Sixty Fathers (Meindert DeJong), China during the Japanese invasion, 1930s
Chu Ju’s House (Gloria Whelan), contemporary rural China
Vietnam:
The Land I Lost: Adventures of a Boy in Vietnam (Quang Nhuong Huynh)
Water Buffalo Days: Growing Up in Vietnam (Quang Nhuong Huynh)
Goodbye, Vietnam (Gloria Whelan), contemporary Vietnam/Hong Kong
India:
Daughter of the Mountains (Louise Rankin), Tibet to Calcutta, 1900s
Gay Neck: The Story of a Pigeon (Dhan Gopal Mukerji)
Australia/Oceania:
Australia:
So Far From Skye (Judith O’Neill)
Polynesia:
Call it Courage (Armstrong Sperry)
Africa:
Akimbo and the Lions (and others) (Alexander McCall Smith)
Listening for Lions (Gloria Whelan), East Africa 1919/England
Morocco:
Star of Light (Patricia M. St. John)
King of the Wind (Maguerite Henry)
South Africa:
Journey to Jo’burg: A South African Story (Beverley Naidoo)
Kenya:
Facing the Lion: Growing up Maasai on the African Savanna (Joseph Lemasolai Lekuton)
13 comments:
OH MY WORD! Can I just say how excited I am that you are doing this?? I have wanted to do/see/have a list like this so bad! I have a ton I can add (particularly where the grandparents are in Africa and New Zealand) - I'll have to get organized to get those to you. Thank you for all the generous sharing you do of so much great work!
PS We have some good ones of Afghanistan and more in Europe, too....
What a wonderful resource! :)
For Norway:
The Klipfish Code by Mary Cassanova
For Michigan (Great Depression):
Bud, Not Buddy by Christopher Paul Curtis
oh ... The Klipfish Code is about Germany's occupation of WW2
regarding the Japanese experience here in the U.S. during WW2:
Bat 6 by Virginia Euwer Wolff
Stubborn Twig by Lauren Kessler (older teens/adults)
Jane Kurtz is a wonderful author who grew up as a missionary child in Ethiopia. Now she writes childrens' books about Africa. She has both picture books for younger children and chapter books. We loved the Storyteller's Beads (chapter) and Saba: Under the Hyena's foot (chapter).
Two great picture books are Fire on the Mountain and Water Hole Waiting (she wrote this with her brother).
That is going to be an awesome list when it's finished!
If you can get a hold of a My Father's World teacher's manual for their Adventures curriculum and their Exploring Countries and Cultures curriculum, you would find huge book lists pertaining to the various states and countries/regions studied within. We're doing Adventures right now, and at the back of the manual divided by week and state, there are extensive book suggestions. This is aimed at 2nd/3rd graders. Countries and Cultures is aimed at 3rd-8th graders with a supplement for 7th/8th. You can find some of these titles on the My Father's World web site, but the lists in the teacher's manuals are awesome!
Oh how perfect! I was wanting to do an "Around the World Stay-cation Adventure" with my boys this summer to keep them busy and learning. Thank you for sharing this great resource!
Alaska:
Aleutian Boy, by Ethel Ross Oliver (1959)
Tisha, by ??? (sorry, it's not in front of me)
What a fabulous list! I've been following your blog for a while and I love it! We have always been interested in travel and have lived in Japan and now Germany. While we travel to different countries I love for the kids to read books on the area we are visiting. We have lots of picture books but as two of my kids enter the world of chapter books I didn't have as many. This is a wonderful resource. Would you mind if I posted a link to it from my blog? WOW, I love this!
I just read The Trumpeter of Krakow a few months ago--and then right after that, the Polish President died, and I felt understood a little about the controversy about burying him in Krakow after understanding more of the history of the city. It was a fascinating story!
This is a great list! I'm using it to request as many books from the library as possible! (And your other recent lists; I'm working backwards from your most recent post).
I love your book lists! And my son is so excited about the samuari books!
Brandy
Hi Heidi! I was looking for book ideas on your blog when I came across this list. How perfect for our year around the world! We are using My Father's World's "Countries and Cultures" as our geography spine this year. I don't have many books to add yet to your list - I'm here to get ideas! - but one that does come to mind is Eleanor Estes' "100 Dresses." That would be under North America, though I'm not sure which state...
Afghanistan: The Breadwinner series is amazing. I read it aloud to my 9 and 11 year old children and they loved it.
Wonderful list! Thank you for putting this together!
Post a Comment