Books for Babies and Toddlers: Black History Month

To me, Black History Month highlights the importance of recognizing and celebrating the many ways Black people have contributed and continue to contribute to art, culture, history, and more. Additionally- and perhaps even more important when focusing on zero to three year olds- February reminds us how critical it is to surround our children with anti-racist and anti-biased messages.

One way we can do this is by providing books authored and illustrated by people of various races and ethnicities, as well as books discussing bias, racism, and activism. Here are of a few of my family’s favorites!

Black Authors and/or Illustrators:

• Princess Hair, written and illustrated by Sharee Miller

  This book is super fun for kids who like princesses because it features princesses enjoying a variety of activities with different hairstyles- tiaras included of course! My three year old daughter loves this one. The illustrations in this book show the beautiful diversity of Black skin tones and hair textures.

• Every Little Thing, written by Cedella Marley and illustrated by Vanessa Brantley-Newton

  This book is for any baby or child who loves music. The words are based on Bob Marley’s song Three Little Birds and if you are familiar with the tune, you can sing the words as you flip the pages. The lighthearted illustrations follow the day of a kid, his cat, and three little birds as they learn to navigate social situations.

• Antoinette and Gaston written by Kelly DiPucchio and illustrated by Christian Robinson

  These books are stories about families of pet dogs- not about people! However, I wanted to include them first, because they are fun stories with great illustrations for little kids and second, because Christian Robinson is an amazing Black illustrator.

  When I was considering books for this list I was surprised (I should not have been.. ) to see that most of our favorite books with Black characters were written and illustrated by white people. I also did not expect (wrongly so) that these books about dog families would be illustrated by a Black artist. So, I wanted to be sure to highlight Robinson’s work as well as my own preconceived biases.

Celebrating Community Activism

• A is for Activist written and illustrated by Innosanto Nagara

  Both of my children love this book, it is great for all ages. Babies are enthralled with the images and love finding the hidden cats as they get older. As children develop more of a vocabulary they are interested in learning the many words throughout this book including “ally”, “grassroots”, and “freedom”.

Anti-Racism

• A Kid’s Book About Racism by Jelani Memory

  This book is a new one for our family this year. I got it from the library because I had been curious about it for a while and I wanted to share it with my three year old. It is recommended for ages five and up, however there is a board book (basically the same but shorter and smaller) version titled A Little Book About Racism that is specifically meant for babies and toddlers and their parents. We love this book. It is super straightforward with appealing visuals and easy to understand concepts. I highly recommend it and I am excited to read more of the A Kid’s Book About.. series.

  * If anyone is interested, this series offers a number of free ebooks on various topics available for download here.

These are just a few of many fantastic children’s books that expose the littlest ones to ideas and images of diversity, acceptance, activism, anti-racism, and more. It is so important to give babies and toddlers access to these ideas from birth, and all year around. Using books is a great place to start.