School supply time and fall are my FAVORITE times of the whole year (if the title Newly Sharpened Pencils didn’t clue you in). I first published this post in 2020, when school looked very different. For our family, it meant online-only first grade until January. While I was fortunate that both my husband and I are currently working from home and can take turns helping our kids, it’s a challenge to make school exciting.
Whether your kids are back in the classroom or learning from home, these books can help the school year feel a little bit more normal. Here are a bunch of back-to-school picture books I love.
The King of Kindergarten by Derrick Barnes and Vanessa Brantley-Newton. This book was released right before my kids started kindergarten last year, and I’ve had a soft spot for it since. I love that it empowers kids to be confident and have a good attitude about going to school. The pictures are adorable, too!
Miss Nelson is Missing by Harry Allard and James Marshall. No back-to-school picture books list would be complete without this classic. If you haven’t read it, you’re in for a treat. James Marshall’s illustrations are hilarious, and my kids love listening to this in the car, too. When Miss Nelson’s students start misbehaving, they quickly realize they had it pretty good when Miss Viola Swamp takes her place.
The Oldest Student: How Mary Walker Learned to Read by Rita Lorraine Hubbard and Oge Mora. I cried reading this inspiring story of former slave Mary Walker, who lived an incredible life and finally learned to read at age 116. What an amazing message that you’re never too old to learn something new! Oge Mora’s illustrations are especially stunning in this book. Buy this one.
My Teacher is a Monster! (No, I Am Not.) by Peter Brown. My kids and I love this book so much, and they frequently pull it off the shelf to read it again. Bobby complains about how mean his teacher is and calls her a monster. Then he runs into her outside of school and realizes that she is not as bad as he thought. I am laughing just thinking about this story. So, so good.
School’s First Day of School by Adam Rex and Christian Robinson. If you’ve got a kid who’s apprehensive about going back to school (and who isn’t right now), this is a great option. School narrates the story, and she is nervous because she’s brand-new and has never had students before. The illustrations are retro and fun, and both School and the kids learn to accept each other.
When Pencil Met Eraser by Karen Kilpatrick, Luis O. Ramas Jr. and German Blanco. I really liked that this book doesn’t focus solely on how erasers remove mistakes. It shows that you need both pencils and erasers to create amazing art, because the eraser softens the image and also can show things that weren’t there before. It’s a great way to talk about art concepts and friendship at the same time.
Ally-saurus and the First Day of School by Richard Torrey. The illustrations make this book so charming and fun for kids (and grownups). Ally loves dinosaurs and insists on being called “Ally-saurus,” but when she goes to school for the first time, she realizes that not all kids love dinosaurs like she does. This can be a starting point for talking about how everyone is different and that we don’t all have to like the same thing.
Lilly’s Purple Plastic Purse by Kevin Henkes. I think I love every single book Kevin Henkes has ever written. He seems to totally get kids and their frustrations. Lilly, a cute little mouse, takes her purple purse to school and can’t keep it to herself. When her teacher takes it away for the day, she gets angry and wants to get back at him, but she realizes she may have been too hasty. I love that this shows both the teacher and the student’s side, and the illustrations are so darling.
Butterflies on the First Day of School by Annie Silvestro and Dream Chen. In this sweet book, students who have “butterflies” in their stomach on the first day of school have them fly out of their mouths as they talk to each other and start to feel less anxious. I love books that illustrate idioms kids don’t really understand, and this one does it beautifully. Even the mom has a butterfly escape from her mouth when she learns her daughter had a good day at school. This is such a darling book.
The Pigeon Has to Go to School by Mo Willems. We all love the Pigeon books. Pigeon reallllly doesn’t want to go to school, but it helps when he learns that he gets to ride a bus to school and play on the playground. And when he realizes the teachers are there to help him. This is a great addition to your shelf if you love Mo Willems.
Too Much: An Overwhelming Day by Jolene Gutierrez and Angel Chang. My kids have a little girl in their grade who struggles with a sensory processing disorder. I’m sure your children or students know someone who has this or face it themselves. This is an excellent book that explains why some children and adults (like me) struggle with bright lights or too much noise or stimulation and how to help them. Every librarian should read this one to students.
Yenebi’s Drive to School by Sendy Santamaria. I was completely blown away by this story about two sisters who live in Tijuana and commute across the U.S./Mexico border to school every day. We had some great conversations with our kids about immigration and borders and also about how valuable education is.
The Brilliant Ms. Bangle by Cara Devins and K-Fai Steele. My mom is an elementary school librarian, and I know she would LOVE this book about a brand-new librarian who has to win over some tough-to-crack kids after the beloved former librarian leaves the school. It gives me Miss Frizzle vibes in the best way.
The World’s Best Class Plant by Liz Garton Scanlon, Audrey Vernick, and Lynnor Bontigao. In this cute story, the class complains about how boring it is to have a class plant when the other classes have pets. Then they start to give the plant more attention and give him a name (Jerry), and he becomes A LOT more interesting.
Mr. S.: A First Day of School Book by Monica Arnaldo. This book is REALLY goofy and quirky, which means kids will absolutely love it. On the first day of school, the kindergarten class is waiting for their teacher but he never arrives. Instead, the chalkboard says “Mr. S.” and a sandwich is sitting on the desk. Could the sandwich be their teacher? The illustrations show what is really happening to the teacher, and they’re hilarious.
The Loud Librarian by Jenna Beatrice and Erika Lynne Jones. I loved this book about a little girl who is assigned to be the class librarian. She adores books and is great at organizing, but the problem is that her voice is too loud. For any of you friends out there who, like me, also have a loud voice, this is a wonderful story about finding your place.
Missing Violet by Kelly Swemba and Fabiana Faiallo. I have to admit that this story broke my heart a bit, because my daughter had a best friend named Violet who moved away. However, it’s an important reminder that friends will sometimes leave and that your classmates can help you remember the good times and find even more friends.
Rick the Rock of Room 214 by Julie Falatko and Ruth Chan. Yes, this story is about a class’s pet rock, and yes, it is quirky. Rick the Rock decides to go on a journey outside after the teacher reads a book about nature, but he realizes it isn’t quite what he expected. Can the students help him find his way back to the classroom?
Luli and the Language of Tea by Andrea Wang and Hyewon Yum. I adore all of Andrea Wang’s books, and this one is really sweet. Luli goes to an English as a second language class for the first time with many other students who also can’t speak English — and can’t communicate with each other. Fortunately, she knows how to bring them together: a tea party!
How to Get Your Octopus to School by Becky Scharnhorst and Jaclyn Sinquett. My kids really liked this book about a little girl who has to get her VERY reluctant octopus dressed and ready for school. It kind of has an If You Give a Mouse a Cookie vibe to it, too, which is fun.
Salat in Secret by Jamilah Thompkins-Bigelow and Hatem Aly. Please read this book with your family. It’s amazing! Muhammad receives a salat rug for his seventh birthday and is encouraged to pray five times a day as part of his Muslim faith. However, he is really nervous about finding a quiet place to pray at school where other students won’t make fun of him. This story has such a great message about acceptance.
This Is a School by John Schu and Veronica Miller Jamison. This is such a beautiful book about what schools mean to a community, including a place for discovery, helping, sharing, healing, and hoping. I want to buy a copy for every school library.
Pa, Me, and Our Sidewalk Pantry by Toni Buzzeo and Zara Gonzalez Hoang. I love Toni Buzzeo’s books, and this one is a sweet story about a grandfather and grandchild who work together to offer their neighbors not just books but food when they need it. Since there are several little free libraries in walking distance of my kids’ school, we particularly liked this book.
My First Day by Phùng Nguyên Quang and Huỳnh Kim Liên. This book is similar to Yenebi’s Drive to School in that it focuses on the lengths one little boy must go to travel to school. In this story, Vietnamese boy An has to navigate the waters around his home in a little wooden boat. The illustrations are stunning.
One Wish: Fatima al-Fihri and the World’s Oldest University by M.O. Yuksel and Mariam Quraishi. I had never heard the story of Fatima al-Fihri, an extraordinary Muslim woman who founded a university in Morocco more than a thousand years ago. Her school still exists today!
Home in a Lunchbox by Cherry Mo. You’ll want a tissue when reading this book about a young girl, Jun, who moves to America from Hong Kong. While she only knows a handful of words in English at her new school, she can feel the love of her family in the food her mom sends in her lunchbox. Soon her new classmates want to try her food, too, since it is so different from their own lunches. SUCH a sweet story!
The Great Banned-Books Bake Sale by Aya Khalil and Anait Semirdzhyan. This is a particularly timely story about a young girl who discovers that books about kids of color have been banned from her school library. She helps to organize a bake sale and use the proceeds to buy diverse books for libraries. The book is also personal, as the author’s book The Arabic Quilt (which I also love and included in my list of books for Arab American Heritage Month) was briefly banned from a Pennsylvania school system.
Paula’s Patches by Gabriella Aldeman and Rocío Arreola Mendoza. Paula rips her jeans and is embarrassed by the hole in her pants and tries to hide it from her classmates. She then creates a patch to cover the hole and discovers that lots of kids have secondhand backpacks or stains or rips—and they all love the patches Paula makes and end up with their own. I love that this story is about not being embarrassed to have something secondhand but that it’s also about reusing and fixing things instead of immediately throwing them out. My son also has a favorite shirt that my sister sewed a patch on when he accidentally ripped it, and he proudly told me that her patch “made it better.” This book will definitely launch important conversations about consumerism.
The Yellow Bus by Loren Long. While this book isn’t specifically about school, it focuses on a yellow school bus that ends up being many things to many different people and animals as it ages. The author and illustrator was inspired to write the book by seeing an old yellow bus in his neighborhood and wondering how it got there.
I’m hoping you love these back-to-school picture books as much as we do. I want to know. What does school look like for your kids this year? And what books do you read to start off a new school year?
