2009 Notable Children's Books in the Language Arts

2009 Notable Children's Books in the Language Arts. Journal of Children's Literature, 35(2), 17-27.

This annual list of children's and young adult books that provide teaching opportunities in the language arts is always good. This time, as always, I say to myself, "I've got to have those books!"

That being said, it seems that this year's 30 selections are more overwhelmingly geared to older children than in the past. Maybe that's just my own perception, since I've been working with really young children over the past two years, so I'm sensitive to age-appropriateness. Still, it's another good list. My eye was especially caught by the choices for the young ones, including E. Choung's Minji's Salon, Nikki Giovanni's anthology, Hip hop speaks to children: A celebration of poetry with a beat, and Y. Morales's Just in case: A trickster's tale and Spanish alphabet book. I think Jon Scieszka's memoir of growing up, Knucklehead: Tall tales and mostly true stories about growing up would be another useful acquisition.