31 Days, 31 Lists: 2024 Message / SEL Books for Kids

The very origins of American picture books are rooted firmly in the tradition of teaching our children strong messages about what is good and what is bad. Those origins are alive and well… in celebrity picture books. Honestly, I swear that 90% of them are trying to instill some kind of a “message” about what kids should do or be. I worry then that people might give up on the whole notion. But if picture books are here to inform and teach then morality is a keen part of that. This year, we’re going to talk about the usual slew of “message” books, while also taking some time to consider those titles that look at social and emotional learning. You’ll see a wide range of titles here today. Hopefully their inclusion will make a certain amount of sense.

For the full PDF of this list you can find it here.

And if you’d like to see previous years’ message books, look no further than here:

• 2023
• 2022
• 2021
• 2020
• 2019
• 2018
• 2017
• 2016

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2024 Books with a Message / Social and Emotional Learning Titles for Kids

Everyone Gets a Turn by Marianne Dubuc, translated by the VeroK Agency

Dubuc specializes in the small. Flashy does nothing for her. When she creates a book, she wants to create a world that your child could just dive into. In this particular tale, four friends discover an egg one day, and everyone wants to care for it. What makes the most sense then is for everyone to care for it equally and to take turns. And that sharing doesn’t end when the egg hatches either. Out comes a fluffy little chick, with four different animals (each with four different personalities) on hand to help it any way they can. Honestly, this is one of the few picture books about communal parenting that you’re likely to find on your shelves these days (if you want to know about gaps in the marketplace, there’s one right there). Sweet, soft, and gentle, but this isn’t pablum. It’s just darned good storytelling. 

Everyone Starts Small by Liz Garton Scanlon, ill. Dominique Ramsey

Before writing this book up I wanted to do a little bit of digging to see what awards Liz Garton Scanlon has gained in the past. As picture book authors go, her work is often extraordinary. I cannot emphasize enough how difficult it is to do what she does on the page. Unfortunately, we don’t really have all that many awards that credit this kind of skill. Sure, one of her books got a Caldecott Honor, but that’s an award for art, not writing. Long story short, please give this woman more awards for writing, universe. Thank you. Now this particular book, Everyone Starts Small, is an excellent example of a topic that’s been done to death, yet can find new life under a talented picture book author’s hand. I’m putting it in the “message” category today because one cannot talk about small things getting bigger without the obvious implications for our young readers. Here, Scanlon’s “everyone” of the title is really more focused on seeds of one sort or another. “Everyone starts small, in seed or sky or rocky bed.” Great first sentence, there. Top notch. As we watch, we pull back to watch trees and rivers doing their thing, then close up again to see ants “Grass and Sun and Bug and Berry rise and ripen too.” The important thing that sets this book apart is the forest fire that appears more than halfway through. That’s timely, but not scary. It’s just another part of life. I love the Fire whispering “I’m tired” when it’s rained upon. With its lilting text, this is a bedtime message book with a notable mention of forest fires. It’s doing several things at once, in the best way possible. Well done. 

Insha’Allah, No, Maybe So by Rhonda Roumani and Nadia Roumani, ill. Olivia Aserr

Sometimes my favorite books are the ones that take something that’s just incredibly common in one culture and introduce it to another. In their authors’ note, the Roumanis explain that the term “Insha’Allah” is one of those phrases used by Muslims and Arabs incredibly often, though until now I can’t think of a picture book that’s ever centered it in any way. In this story Ranya’s the kind of kid who figured out long ago that if she asks for something and her mom says “Insha’Allah”, that probably means no. At least that’s how she sees it anyway. Mama explains to Ranya that it’s actually a little more complicated than that. It doesn’t really mean “maybe” either, though. More, it’s the kind of phrase it use when you want to make it clear that Allah may have different plans than the ones you do. I’m reminded of the old phrase, “If you want to make God laugh, tell her your plans.” The Roumanis do a good job of showing cases where Ranya both gets what she wants and doesn’t. And as a parent, I, for one, appreciated Mama saying she’ll take Ranya to Disneyworld… “before you turn eighteen. Insha’Allah.” 

Just What to Do by Kyle Lukoff, ill. Hala Tahboub

I cannot be the only one who has been searching for the next The Rabbit Listened, can I? Another book that with an exquisitely simple text is able to use the simplest of words to tell kids (and, let’s face it, their adult readers) what to do when someone is experiencing a kind of grief. The hero of this book (so nicely rendered without any particular gender) starts out overflowing with confidence. They know “just what to do” when their brother’s cactus dies. A homemade sympathy card, right? But when he says he wants a joke instead, their tactics change. And with each person, explaining what they need (a hug, help passing out snacks, the chance to show old photos) the child changes too, until by the time they get to their best friend mourning their grandmother they literally don’t know what to do. So they ask. It’s so simple, and I love that the best friend also has no idea what they can do to help. All they can do is just spend time together and figure it out with one another. Kyle just gets it, man. This is how you write this kind of a book. A book about listening to people and figuring stuff out together. Because lord knows, none of us know. Not really. The perfect message book, simply put. 

Marley’s Pride by Joëlle Retener, ill. DeAnn Wiley

If you are a librarian or a bookseller and someone walks up to you and asks, “What is a picture book that shows intersectionality?” your immediate response should be to pull out a copy of Marley’s Pride and then brandish it proudly. In this tale you’ve Marley, who has some anxiety issues when it comes to crowds. This feeling is seriously getting in the way of their desire to participate in the big Pride celebrations, though. Zaza, Marley’s grandparent, is kind of the star of those festivities, and would really like Marley to come along. So, after doing some yoga and deep breathing (as well as packing noise-canceling headphones, a fidget spinner, and a very necessary lavender bunny), Marley is ready to give it a try. There’s just a really accepting groove to the whole proceedings, and I was reminded of Mermaids On Parade by Melanie Hope Greenberg as I watched the variety of events and people. The backmatter of this book is maybe some of the best I’ve seen too. I was particularly taken with the display of different flags (I didn’t know that the updated rainbow flag was called the “Progress Pride”). Great stuff!

Not a Smiley Guy by Polly Horvath, ill. Boris Kulikov

Wow. I hereby award the Best Last Sentence in a Picture Book Award to (drumroll please) POLLY HORVATH! In this tale, a little boy named Ernest just, as the title says, is “not a smiley guy”. Nothing wrong with that except it freaks the heck out of other people. I love the description of what happens when baby Ernest gives smiling a try. “But aside from the interesting stretchy face sensation it was not for him.” When pressed by his parents to explain what would truly make him happy he confesses that what he really wants is an elephant. When he gets one (named Marcia, no less) his parents are baffled. Why isn’t he happy now? Ernest has to explain that he’s actually happy most of the time. His parents then ask if there was some way that he could show it. So the occasional jig is decided upon. And as the book concludes, “You don’t have to change, but for the people you love you do what you can.” I may have that line embroidered on something someday, it’s such an incredible message. Kulikov, for his part, has a lot of fun working elephant silhouettes into the art long before Marcia’s appearance. This one’s a joy. 

Peggy the Always Sorry Pigeon by Wendy Meddour, ill. Carmen Saldaña

There is a wide range of “messages” that picture books try to teach young children. And while I’m sure I can’t say that I’ve seen them all, I have seen a great swath of them over the years. Yet in all my time, I’ve never seen anyone dare to teach kids (especially girls) NOT to apologize when other people push them around. It’s a nuanced lesson but a necessary one, and while I wouldn’t say that Peggy the Always Sorry Pigeon is the only book you’d ever hand a child on the subject, it certainly does work as a good introduction to the concept. In this tale, Peggy is constantly apologizing whenever anyone else tells her to move or leave. It takes a watching seagull to inform Peggy that she’s not doing anything wrong and should not be apologizing for simply existing. The two then go back to the three places where other animals told her off, and Peggy gets this cathartic series of moments where she gets to yell amusingly oblique statements in her own defense. It’s great fun, and would probably make for a good readaloud, come to think of it. A perhaps necessary tome for kids today.

Sam and Lucy by Maryjo Scott

There was a year or two there when you couldn’t walk into a children’s room in a library without stumbling over three or four new dead dog books. Recently, I’ve noticed that we’ve been seeing less new death-of-a-pet tales coming out, and I can’t help but wonder what that says about the publishing industry/the pet industry in this country. Now with a dead pet book you’ve a number of directions you can travel in. You can try to encompass the entire life of the pet and the child who knows them. Usually, if you want to do that, you have to either start the pet small with the kid’s parents or you have to make the kid a teenager or young adult when the pet dies. I guess the advantage of a book like Sam and Lucy is that you don’t need to make that choice when the pet in question has a very short lifespan anyway. Chickens, after all, are not noted for their longevity. And considering how many kids in this country are growing up with chickens these days (urban farming having taken off a little after the pandemic), this may be a legitimate death of a chicken pet book for some kids. The story follows young white blond Sam and his favorite chicken Lucy. You see Lucy from babyhood onwards. When Lucy grows old, the doctor tells Sam to just give her extra love. The book doesn’t end with her death necessarily, though it’s certainly implied. You just end on a hilltop with Sam and Lucy watching the sky together. And did I tear up? Do you even need to ask? A softer, sweeter, more chickeny-er death of a beloved pet story.

Sister Friend by Jamilah Thompkins-Bigelow, ill. Shahrzad Maydani

Sometimes it takes the right text for you to be able to see an illustrator in a whole new light. Shahrzad Maydani has illustrated a slew of picture books in the past already, but there’s something about her work on SISTER FRIEND that feels completely different. And not gradually throughout the book but right there at the start. That initial sequence of Ameena playing hopscotch by herself just has so much zip and personality to it! It’s an incredible introduction to a story that’s unafraid to touch on pain. Ameena’s the only Black girl, and certainly the only Muslim girl, in her class. When a new classmate arrives named Sundus, Ameena is delighted. But this isn’t a story of instant friendship or anything. Misunderstandings and miscommunications plague the two girls, keeping them from connecting. And what Ameena takes as rudeness eventually resolves itself as an embarrassment over Sundus’s inability to speak English fluently. Did I tear up at the end? I bloody well did tear up at the end yep. 

Time to Make Art by Jeff Mack

What exactly is art? What can it be? As one small child asks these questions, artists ancient and modern make it clear that art is whatever you want it to be. Inspiring and fun! You know, I didn’t think it could necessarily be done, but Jeff Mack has managed to create a book where a ton of artists are visually referenced and it’s actually really very good! This feels like the second in a series that Mack started with MARCEL’S MASTERPIECE. Like that book, this one is helping kids to question what “art” really is. I like any book that breaks down their objections to creation, and this one is brilliant. I’m also giving it extra points for making it clear that photography is art (Cindy Sherman gets a cameo), which is something that most art books ignore (for adults AND kids). Love the message, love the style, and love how damned inclusive it is. Plus there were quite a few folks in here that I want to now discover for myself. 

Ursula Upside Down by Corey R. Tabor

 

Ursula is a merry little catfish, happily swimming about her day, until other creatures try to tell her she’s completely upside down. A flipped-format picture book with a clever bit of messaging inside. Clearly I have the memory of a goldfish myself. I picked this book up, started reading it, and when it started to utilize all these neat ways of twisting and turning it to keep reading I found myself thinking, “This is really neat! It really feels like a book that Corey R. Tabor would do!” At the end I checked out the creator. Oops. So, I guess, the man’s consistent if nothing else. As with his other science-y picture book titles, he’s unafraid to use animals to make larger points. This one could probably be summed up as “Find your tribe” as well as the more pedantic “Don’t be afraid to be yourself”. I have a feeling that there are a lot of little upside-down catfishes out there that are going to relate to it. 

Victor: The Wolf with Worries by Catherine Rayner

Catherine Rayner is one of those British author/illustrators that I wish we could just import to the States. Mind you, that wouldn’t be very fair to Edinburgh, where she lives, but I care not a jot. She has this incredible watercolor style that extraordinarily difficult to explain. Think a cuddly Stephen Gammell, all extra scraggly lines but with an essential core of cute. Victor? I am Victor. You are Victor. WE are Victor. Victor fears that compared to the other wolves he is not very “wolfish”. “In fact, Victor worries about pretty much everything.” I hear ya, buddy. The book goes on to explain that “Victor worries he is not BIG enough. And so he tries pretending to be big. But then he worries that people might think he is big enough to do things he is actually too worried to do.” Are you feeling him yet? Thanks to his friend Pablo he’s able to eventually put some of his wolfish worries aside, “because worries come and go. But that’s OK.” Darn right, little guy. 

A Voice in the Storm by Karl James Mountford

Rat sometimes feels like the storm inside of her is stronger than the ones in the sky. When she encounters Bear, he lets her know how to let some of those feelings out and also how to ask for help. Aw, I dunno. I’m actually very fond of this. But, the grain of salt that I’d add, is that I was also fond of Mountford’s previous (and somewhat similar) title Circles in the Sky, which came out two years ago. That book was all about death. This one’s all about depression. Fun! Only I just really like what this book has to say on the topic. It’s probably better suited for older readers trying to make sense of what a friend or family member is going through. I’d encourage folks to give it a deep read. It’s not a flashy book, but I like it.

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So with all that in mind, here are the other lists for 2024:

December 1 – Great Board Books

December 2 – Picture Book Readalouds

December 3 – Simple Picture Book Texts

December 4 – Transcendent Holiday Picture Books

December 5 – Rhyming Picture Books

December 6 – Funny Picture Books

December 7 – CaldeNotts

December 8 – Picture Book Reprints

December 9 – Bilingual Books for Kids

December 10 – Math Books for Kids

December 11 – Books with a Message / Social Emotional Learning

December 12 – Fabulous Photography

December 13 – Translated Picture Books

December 14 – Fairy Tales / Folktales / Religious Tales

December 15 – Wordless Picture Books

December 16 – Poetry Books

December 17 – Unconventional Children’s Books

December 18 – Easy Books & Early Chapter Books

December 19 – Comics & Graphic Novels

December 20 – Older Funny Books

December 21 – Science Fiction Books

December 22 – Fantasy Books

December 23 – Informational Fiction

December 24 – Gross Books

December 25 – Science & Nature Books

December 26 – Unique Biographies

December 27 – Blueberry Award Contenders (Celebrating the Environment)

December 28 – Nonfiction Picture Books

December 29 – Nonfiction Books for Older Readers

December 30 – Middle Grade Novels

December 31 – Picture Books

Filed under: 31 Days 31 Lists, Best Books, Best Books of 2024