Books to Teach Writer's Craft with in Middle School

Detail from Crazy Horse's Vision by S.D. Nelson (Illustrator)

Connecting Illustrations & Text
Begay, Shonto (Dine). 1995. Navajo: Visions and Voices Across the Mesa. NY: Scholastic.
Bruchac, Joseph. 2000. Crazy Horse’s Vision. Illustrated by S. D. Nelson. NY: Lee & Low.
Burleigh, Robert. 2006. Tiger of the Snows: Tenzing Norgay: The Boy Whose Dream Was Everest.
Illustrated by Ed Young. New York: Atheneum Books.
cummings, e.e. 2005. Love: Selected Poems. Art by Christopher Myers. New York: Jump at the
Sun.
Duggleby, John.1998. Story Painter: The Life of Jacob Lawrence. San Francisco: Chronicle
Books.
Ellabbad, Mohieddine. 2006. The Illustrator’s Notebook. Toronto: Groundwood Books.
Feelings, Tom. 1995. The Middle Passage: White Ships/Black Cargo. New York: Dial.
Hughes, Langston. 1995. The Block. Paintings by Romare Bearden. NY: Viking Juvenile.
Myers, Walter Dean. 2005. Patrol: An American Soldier in Vietnam. Collage by Ann Grifalconi. New York: HarperTrophy.
Shange, Ntozake.1994. I Live in Music. Paintings by Romare Bearden. New York: Welcome Books.
Sis, Peter. 2007. The Wall: Growing Up Behind the Iron Curtain. NY: Farrar, Straus and Giroux.
Young, Ed. 2005. Beyond the Great Mountains: A Visual Poem About China. San Francisco, CA: Chronicle.

Detail from Tom Feelings, The Middle Passage.

Craft: Language & Syntax
Barakat, Ibtisam 2007. Tasting the Sky: A Palestinian Childhood. New York: Farrar, Straus, &Giroux.
Flores-Galbis, Enrique. 2010. 90 Miles from Havana. Roaring Brook Press.
Giovanni, Nikki. 1996. Shimmy Shimmy Shimmy Like My Sister Kate: Looking at the Harlem Renaissance through Poems. New York: Henry Holt.
Haskins, Jim & Benson, Kathleen. 2006. John Lewis in the Lead: A Story of the Civil Rights Movement. Illustrated by Benny Andrews. NY: Lee & Low.
Johnson, Angela. 2003. A Cool Moonlight. Illustrated by Kamil Vojnar. New York: Dial Books.
Jordan, June. 1995. Poetry for the People; A Revolutionary Blueprint. New York: Routledge.
Joseph, Lynn. 2002. The Color of My Words. New York: HarperTrophy.
Miller-Lachmann, Lyn, (Ed). 2003. Once Upon a Cuento. Williamantic, CT: Curbstone Press.
Mora, Pat. 2000. My Own True Name: New and Selected Poems for Young Adults. Houston, TX: Arte Publico Press.
Myers, Walter Dean. 2007. What They Found: Love on 145th Street. New York: Wendy Lamb Books. Nelson, S.D. 2006. Quiet Hero: The Ira Hayes Story. NY: Lee & Low Books.
Rushdie, Salman. 1990. Haroun and the Sea of Stories. New York: Penguin.
Santiago, Chiori. 2002. Home to Medicine Mountain.Illustrated by Judith Lowry. San Francisco, CA:
Children’s Book Press.
Urrea, Luis Alberto.2000. Vatos. El Paso, TX: CInco Puntos Press.
Wong, Janet S. 1999. The Rainbow Hand: Poems About Mothers and Children. Illustrated by Jennifer Hewiston. New York: Margaret K. McElderry Books.
Woodson, Jacqueline. 1995. From the Notebooks of Melanin Sun. New York: The Blue Sky Press.

Text Structure: Non-Fiction/Essay

Bial, Raymond. 2000. A Handful of Dirt. NY: Walker Books.
Bryson, Bill. 2000. I'm a Stranger Here Myself: Notes on Returning to America After 20 Years Away. NY: Broadway.
Burns, Loree Griffin. 2007. Tracking Trash: Flotsam, Jetsam, and the Science of Ocean Motion (Scientists in the Field). Boston: Houghton.
Curry, Barbara K. & Brodie, James M. 1996. Sweet Words So Brave The Story of African American Literature. Illustrated by Jerry Butler. Madison, WI: Zino Press.
Freedman, Russell. 1998. Martha Graham: A Dancer’s Life. NY: Clarion.
Glover, Savion, and Bruce Weber. 2000. Savion: My Life in Tap. New York: Morrow.
Gore, Al. 2007. An Inconvenient Truth: The Crisis of Global Warming, Rev. Ed. Adapted by Jane O’Connor. NY: Viking/Penguin.
Hill, Laban Carrick. 2004. Harlem Stomp! A Cultural History of the Harlem Renaissance. New York: Little Brown.
Lopez, Barry. 1989. Crossing Open Ground. NY: Vintage.
Major, John S., Belanus, Betty J. and Yo-Yo Ma. 2002. Caravan to America: Living Arts of the Silk Road. Chicago, IL: Cricket Books.
Marx, Trish. 2007. Steel Drumming at the Apollo: The Road to Super Top Dog. Illustrated by Ellen B.
Senisi. NY: Lee & Low.
Mora, Pat. 2002. A Library for Juana: The World of Sor Juana Ines. Illustrated by Beatriz Vidal. New York: Knopf.
Orgill, Roxane. 2001. Shout, Sister, Shout!: Ten Girl Singers Who Shaped A Century. NY: Margaret K.McElderry.
Schlitz, Lara Amy. 2007. Good Masters! Sweet Ladies! Voices from a Medieval Village. Illustrated by Robert Byrd. Cambridge, MA: Candlewick.
Siry, Alexandra. 2007. Sneeze! Watertown. MA: Charlesbridge Publishing.
Zhang, Ange. 2004. Red Land, Yellow River: A Story from the Cultural Revolution. Toronto: Ground- wood.


Text Crafting: Fiction & Poetry
Adoff, Arnold. 1997. I Am the Darker Brother: An An- thology of Modern Poems by African Americans. New York: Simon & Schuster.
Bradbury, Ray. 1985. Dandelion Wine. New York: Bantam Books.Bruchac, Joseph. 2006. Wabi: A Hero’s Tale. NY: Dial.
Cheng, Andrea. 2004. Honeysuckle House. Asheville, NC: Front Street.
Compestine, Ying Chang. 2007. Revolution Is Not a Dinner Party. New York: Henry Holt.
Danticat, Edwidge. 2003. Behind the Mountains. New York: Scholastic.
Erdrich, Louise. 2002. The Range Eternal. Illustrated by Steve Johnson/Lou Fancher. NY: Hyperion.
Greenberg, Jan. 2001. Heart to Heart: New Poems Inspired by Twentieth-Century American Art. New York: Harry N. Abrams..
Johnston, Tony. 2007. Bone By Bone By Bone. New Milford, CT: Roaring Brook Press.
Lopez, L. Luis. 2000. Musings of a Barrio Sack Boy. Grand Junction, CO: Farolito Press. (Selections).
Mosley, Walter. 2005. 47. Boston: Little, Brown.
Myers, Walter Dean. 2006. Street Love. NY: Amistad.
Neri, G. 2007. Chess Rumble. Illustrated by Jesse Joshua Watson. NY: Lee & Low.
Nye, Naomi Shihab. 1998. The Space Between Our Footsteps: Poems and Paintings from the Middle East. New York: Simon & Schuster.
Smith, Charles R. 2007. Hoop Queens. Cambridge, MA: Candlewick Press.Sullivan, Charles (Ed.). 1994. Here Is My Kingdom: Hispanic-American Literature and Art for Young People. NY: Abrams.
Weatherford, Carole Boston. 2007. Birmingham, 1963. Honesdale, PA: Wordsong.

Ways with Genre
Abadzis, Nick. 2007. Laika. New York: First Second. Cardenas, Teresa. 2006. Letters to My Mother. Translated by David Unger. Toronto: Groundwood.
Ellis, Deborah. The Breadwinner Trilogy.
2000. The Breadwinner. Toronto: Groundwood.
2003. Mud City. Toronto: Groundwood.
2002. Parvana’s Journey. Toronto: Groundwood.
Grandits, John. 2007. Blue Lipstick: Concrete Poems. New York: Clarion.
Halilbegovich, Nadja. 2006. My Childhood Under Fire: A Sarajevo Diary. Tonawanda, NY: Kids Can Press.
Hubbard, Jim (Ed.). 1994. Shooting Back From the Reservation: A Photographic View of Life by Native American Youth. Foreword by Dennis Banks (Anishinaabe). NY: The New Press
Jiménez, Francisco. 2001. Breaking Through. Boston: Houghton.
Khan, Rukhsana. 1988. The Roses in My Carpets. Illustrated by Ronald Himler. Markham, Ontario: Fitzhenry and Whiteside.
Levine, Ellen. 2000. Freedom's Children: Young Civil Rights Activists Tell Their Own Stories. NY: Putnam Juvenile.
Lin, Grace. 2009. Where the Mountain Meets the Moon. NY: Little, Brown.
Lopez, Barry. 1997. Lessons from the Wolverine. Illustrated by Tom Pohrt. Athens, GA: University of Georgia Press.
Nelson, Marilyn. 2005. A Wreath for Emmett Till. Illustrated by Philippe Lardy. Boston: Houghton.
Patton, Christopher. 2007. Jack Pine. Illustrations by Cybele Young. Toronto: Groundwood.
Pinkney, Andrea Davis. 2000. Let it Shine: Stories of Black Women Freedom Fighters. Illustrated by Stephen Alcorn. San Diego: Harcourt.
Tan, Shaun. 2007. Arrival. NY: Arthur A. Levine.
Testa, Maria. 2007. Something About America. Cambridge, MA: Candlewick.
Yoo, Paula. 2005. Sixteen Years in Sixteen Seconds: The Sammy Lee Story. Illustrated by Dom Lee. NY: Lee & Low.