Episode 411: Children’s Biographies

Hello! Thank you for joining us on Reading With Libraries! We’re so glad you could be here to enjoy our book group podcast.

We are the Central Minnesota Libraries Exchange, and we support libraries of all types: schools, publics, academics, and special libraries and archives. We started this podcast to provide useful information for library people doing Reader’s Advisory work. There are so many books out there that it’s tough to be an expert on all of them. So we pick a new genre each week to chat about and hopefully provide you with some insight into what may be an unfamiliar genre!

This week we’re discussing biographies for kids! We’re excited to welcome back Guest Host librarian Kate!

Beverages:

Each week we like to connect the theme of our books with our beverages, and we each came prepared with our own drink to enjoy while we talk about our books. Each of our beverages will have a recipe or a link on our episode page, so you can try them yourself. Our recipes come from All Recipes.com and are very kid-friendly!

Banana Bonkers

  • 3 bananas
  • 3 cups grapefruit juice
  • 2 cups lemon sherbet
  • 1 cup crushed ice
  • Puree bananas in a blender or food processor. In a gallon pitcher combine pureed bananas, grapefruit juice, lemon sherbet and crushed ice. Stir and serve.

Easy Green Monster Smoothie

  • 2 cups baby spinach 
  • 2 apples, peeled, cored, and chopped
  • 2 sliced bananas
  • 1 cup chopped carrots 
  • 1 cup orange juice
  • 1 cup fresh strawberries, 1 cup ice
  • Puree in a blender until smooth!


Razzy Blue Smoothie

  • 16 whole almonds
  • 1 banana
  • ¼ cup rolled oats
  • 1 tb flaxeed
  • 1 cup frozen blueberries
  • 1 cup raspberry yogurt
  • ¼ cup grape juice
  • 1 cup 1% buttermilk
  • Peel the banana and cut into 1/2-inch chunks. Chill in freezer until solid, about 2 hours.
  • Place the almonds, oats, and flaxseed meal into a blender; pulse until finely ground. Add the frozen banana, frozen blueberries, yogurt, grape juice, and buttermilk; puree until smooth.

Sunny Orange Lemonade 

  • 4 ¼ cups water, divided
  • 1 cup sugar
  • ¾ cups lemon juice
  • ¾ cups orange juice
  • 2 teaspoons grated lemon peel
  • 1 teaspoon grated orange peel
  • Ice cubes, lemon slices
  • In a saucepan, bring 1-1/4 cups water and sugar to a boil. Reduce heat. Simmer for 10 minutes; cool. Transfer to a pitcher; add lemon and orange juices and peels. Cover and refrigerate for at least 1 hour. Stir in the remaining water. Serve over ice. Garnish with lemon if desired.

Genre Discussion:

Encyclopedia.com has an entire article giving background information on the genre of Biographies within Children’s Literature. They define Children’s Biographies as “Biographies of important cultural, social, and historical figures written for juvenile and young adult audiences.”

Children’s biographies remain a highly specialized field in which the demands of accuracy, general interest, and usage are often debated by both critics and educators. Many children’s literature scholars have argued that issues of factual accuracy and the tendency of authors to “sugar-coat” the lives of their subjects for young readers limits the impact of many children’s biographies.

How historical fact is composed for young audiences has been an issue of great debate in the children’s literature field, particularly because many children’s biographies are expressly written with the underlying intention of inspiring child readers to revere major historical figures and learn from their examples. 

Suggested Reading Resources:

Our Book Discussion

Now we have some good background information on children’s biographies, let’s get to our book discussion!

Whoosh!: Lonnie Johnson’s Super-Soaking Stream of Inventions, by Chris Barton @Bartography

Pies from Nowhere: How Georgia Gilmore Sustained the Montgomery Bus Boycott, by Dee Romito @writeforapples

Planting Stories: The Life of Librarian and Storyteller Pura Belpré, by Anika Aldamuy Denise @AnikaDenise

I Dissent: Ruth Bader Ginsberg Makes Her Mark, by Debbie Levy @debbielevybooks

Around America to Win the Vote: Two Suffragists, a Kitten, and 10,000 Miles, by Mara Rockliff @mararockliff

Duke Ellington: The Piano Prince and His Orchestra, by Andrea Pinkney @AndreaDavisPink

Elvis is King!, by Jonah Winter

Chef Roy Choi and the Street Food Remix, by Jacqueline Briggs Martin and June Jo Lee @junejolee

El Defo, by Cece Bell @CeceBellBooks

Hey, Kiddo, by Jarrett J. Krosoczka by @StudioJJK And here are the Jarrett’s TED Talks we reference in this episode: here

Tricky Vic: The Impossibly True Story of the Man Who Sold the Eiffel Tower, by Greg Pizzoli @gregpizzoli

The Important Thing About Margaret Wise Brown, by Mac Barnett

Conclusion:

Thank you so much for joining us for this discussion about kid biographies, and thanks to our Guest Host Kate for all your fantastic suggestions!

Join us next Thursday with another genre, more guest hosts for our book group, and more books to share and discuss. Be sure to subscribe to our podcast so you don’t miss a single episode! And if you want to hear more about the work we do in libraries – which is always interesting! – subscribe to our podcast Linking Our Libraries.

Bring your book ideas, bring your beverages, and join us back here on Thursday!