TOGETHER WE GROW: ENGAGEMENT TOOLS & READ ALOUD
Best Users: Librarians, Educators, Home Learners, SEL Educators, Immigration Organizations
Best Audience: Children Grades 00-05
READ ALOUD & DISCUSSION WITH LCSW FAMILY & CHILD THERAPIST
ABOUT THE ENGAGEMENT TOOLS
Discussion Guide for Educators & Families
This book can be an opening for amazing conversations with children (and adults). As child and family LCSW therapist Bonnie Thomas says, “We grow together when we talk with one another.” Bonnie’s spread-by-spread discussion questions offer opportunities to explore Together We Grow for Social Emotional Learning. I’m Your Neighbor Books, an organization that creates family and classroom conversation about immigration, welcoming, and belonging, also contributed questions to the discussion.
DOWNLOAD
Together We Grow: Discussion Questions
(PDF)
Barn Paper Craft
All of the action of the picture book centers around the barn. The open barn doors represent an invitation, an opening, and a welcoming. Illustrator Kelly Murphy designed an amazing little paper craft that allows the reader to make their own barn. Inside, they can include the animals and messages they want to fold into the barn’s four walls. There is room for us all.
DOWNLOAD
Together We Grow: Barn Paper Craft
(PDF)
Community Posters
Together We Grow’s welcoming message seems so pertinent today as the country fights the pandemic, racial injustice, immigration bans, family separation, and a growing anxiety. It may be time to inspire both empathy and welcoming. We took the picture books’ core phrases: Together We Grow, There is Room for Us All, and Love Prevails and made them into community posters for readers to hang on telephone poles, fences, or bulletin boards. Those community posters have tear-off tabs with those messages and a URL. The URL leads to the video read-aloud.
DOWNLOAD Together We Grow: Community Posters (PDF)
ABOUT THE BOOK
Together We Grow
By Susan Vaught
Illustrated by Kelly Murphy
Publisher: Simon & Schuster/Paula Wiseman Books
ISBN-13: 9781534405868
Lightning gash!
Windy lash!
A storm drives all the farm animals indoors except for a lonely fox family. The barn isn’t their home. But where will they go for safety?
This stunning picture book explores themes of acceptance and belonging:
Large or small,
Short and tall,
There is room,
There is room,
There is room
For us all.
““A gentle tale of inclusion and fairness that children will clearly understand.”
—Booklist (starred review)
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“A truly inspiring picture book that will resonate with both children and adults.”
—School Library Journal (starred review)
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“Emotionally charged and eloquently rendered in words and art, this picture book is worth owning and cherishing.” —Kirkus Reviews (starred review)
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“Inviting dialogue about the need for inclusivity, Vaught offers a lyrical narrative.”
—Publishers Weekly (starred review)
THE GIVEAWAY WINNERS
In August 2020, 30 individual copies of Together We Grow were given away to teachers, librarians, or literacy folks. Our thanks to Paula Wiseman Books for the generous donation! Congratulations to our winners!
Ashe County Public Library | West Jefferson | NC |
Book Professional Working @ Home | Calhoun | GA |
Book Professional Working @ Home | Brooklyn | NY |
Book Professional Working @ Home | Mahopac | NY |
Book Professional Working @ Home | Ponca City | OK |
Book Professional Working @ Home | Saunderstown | RI |
Book Professional Working @ Home | Kents Store | VA |
Boone County Public Library | Burlington | KY |
Clarence Galm Elementary/ | San Antonio | TX |
Community Partnership of the Ozarks | Springfield | MO |
Drake Community Library | Grinnell | IA |
Fairhope Public Library | Fairhope | AL |
Francis McClure Elementary | White Oak | PA |
Greene County Public Library | Fairborn | OH |
Hagen Ranch Road Branch | Delray Beach | FL |
Kirtland Public Library | Kirtland | OH |
Kokomo Howard County Public Library | Kokomo | IN |
Mansfield Public Library | Mansfield | TX |
Marshall County Public Library @Benton | Benton | KY |
Mead Public Library | Sheboygan | WI |
MSAD 75 Bowdoin Central School | West Bowdoin | ME |
North Bellmore Public Library | North Bellmore | NJ |
Ocean Twp bd of ed | Wall | NJ |
Roosevelt Elementary | Mesa | AZ |
San Diego Public Library | San Diego | CA |
Shrewsbury Borough School | Shrewsbury | NJ |
South Shore Community Action Council | plymouth | MA |
Sunset Hill Library | Lawrence | KS |
The Vanguard School | malvern | PA |
Valley View School | McHenry | IL |