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For more than 60% of children in the U.S., walking into a school or library represents their first encounter with books. If we make that experience as welcoming as possible, we're giving them fuel for success.

Whether they are going to school for the first time or facing the beginning of another academic year, the start of the school year can be a time of high emotions for little ones. Share these titles to help them prepare.

 Had it with X? Here’s how to get the most out of other platforms and dig deep into Substack.

While book bans and other efforts to curtail free expression in schools have made headlines, canceled visits have gone relatively unmarked. SLJ spoke with authors about their experiences. 

Self-directed programming can be as simple as a table with coloring sheets and wildlife livecams or as in-depth as a complex scavenger hunt.

Outstanding school librarians share new ideas, reboots, and advice for 2024–25.

Librarians pitch current favorites, from breathtaking escape stories to heartwarming yarns. 

Starting a new school, or even a new school year, can elicit a lot of emotions for many children. These board books, picture books, and early readers will help reassure young readers that all will be well when they step into their new classroom.

Used in concert with traditional teaching methods, these resources for creation, instruction, research, and grading can make learning more dynamic.

Join three librarians on August 26 for some show-and-tell as they discuss and demonstrate brain-building read-alouds, tantalizing tech tools, and crowd-pleasing crafts and activities. 

Incorporating interactive features, engaging text, and delightful rhymes, these board books encourage the magic of a shared reading experience that no screen, app, or video can replicate.

Who runs the world? Girls! March is Women's History Month. Share these diverse stories of brave, fierce, powerful women of the past and present with tweens to inspire them throughout the year.

Librarians should be attuned to alternative reading options so that blind and low-vision students have the same access to books as their sighted peers.

In these works, silly creatures impart wise messages.

These picture books and graphic novels for elementary students through high schoolers show the power of illustration to convey complex emotions.

Illustrated works show the power of pictures to convey complex feelings—and why building a visual collection can be one of the best things you do for your teens.

Since D/deaf experiences vary greatly, it’s important to offer kids multiple titles about D/deaf characters and characters with hearing loss, showcasing these differences.

Is ChatGPT the new Wikipedia, riddled with inaccuracies, used by students seeking a shortcut? It could be. But it doesn’t have to be. That points to our next venture as librarians: AI literacy instruction.

With a focus on student equity and revenue scenarios, these librarians put their own stamp on book fairs. 

Librarians cite flexibility, close attention, and other reasons for working with smaller bookstores. 

These series about friend duos will appeal to young children just starting to read independently—and watching the streaming show on Apple TV.  

Reading about animals who have the same fears and other feelings about going back to school can help young readers face their own.

The braids of challah include love, joy, and unity, and a missing babka leads to community. If you're seeking out books about Jewish joy, we've spotlighted two picture books sure to make readers glow. Bring snacks!

Mystery? Sci-fi? Getting books in the right categories makes genrefying worth it and helps kids find what they want.   

The first day of school, separation anxiety, a sandwich running the classroom—all the usual suspects show up in these seven beauts about helping kids cross the transom back into the world of curiosity and learning!

How teachers and librarians have brought nonfiction front and center at their schools.

Mispronouncing a student’s name can have a significant negative impact. Getting it right sends a better, affirming message. 

These titles about children contemplating their names offer opportunities to discuss family stories and histories, self-esteem, and more. 

Back to school means time to revisit Dr. Ibram X. Kendi's How to Raise an Antiracist. This New York Times bestseller is his answer to the many questions parents and educators have on how to bring children into conversation, about how to be better citizens in the world, and how to treat their peers with compassion and inclusion.

We live in a world where everything from a microscopic virus to a gun the size of a baseball bat has tried to kill our children. Books—and acknowledging a child's fear—can help.

Our reviews teams scoured the lists for the best of new books to take on the first days of school.

Summer is here and it's time to celebrate with a fresh round of board books! This round-up includes an eclectic mix of books about emotions, pronouns, family, shapes, plants, and more. Every librarian will find something for their library in this board book round-up of fiction, non-fiction, and some that are a little bit of both. 

The start of a new school year can be scary for all students, but especially younger ones. Share these stories to help them laugh, find someone who understands what they’re feeling, and give them tools to help navigate the new year.

Anxiety about the return to school is sharply rising, right along with COVID-19 infection rates due to the Delta variant. To help inform K-12 school communities, a panel of Duke University experts in pediatrics, psychiatry, and neuroscience offered some advice.

Help smooth the path from in-person to online making.

How are school librarians preparing to serve students in fall 2020? Your participation will help SLJ tell the story. 

As Hispanic Heritage Month kicks off on September 15, here’s SLJ’s coverage of titles for kids, tweens, and teens with Latinx creators and characters. Our roundup of this year’s reviews and interviews features #OwnVoices creators and books that center Latinx experiences.

Back to school selections, including picture books and middle grade graphic novels and realistic fiction, with related activities from “The Classroom Bookshelf.”

YouTube is the most popular social media for teenagers. BookTube has been growing for a number of years, and for those who aren’t already tapped into the world of book lovers who share their insights and passions on the video site, it can be challenging to figure out where to begin.

The National Student Poets are a group of five high school juniors and seniors who act as literary ambassadors for a year. In honor of National Poetry Month, they recommend five books for their fellow high schoolers.