Multicultural Children’s Book Day – I Don’t Want to Go!
The author sent me this book to review as part of Multicultural Children’s Book Day 2017. Thank you so much for sharing!
In I Don’t Want to Go! by Delores Connors, Mark is being moved from his classroom to a new, special education classroom. He keeps repeating the phrase, “I don’t want to go” again and again. He doesn’t want to leave his friends and his “big classroom” for this new unknown element. His mother and his new teacher try to comfort him and ease his fears and embarrassment as he makes this challenging transition.
Other than a brief allusion to fights and failing test papers, we are never privy to the specific reasons for Mark’s transition to his new “little classroom”. This ambiguity, coupled with the silhouette illustrations that are all we see of the characters might make it easier for children making similar transitions to identify with Mark’s plight – we don’t know what his specific difficulties are, only his emotions about the challenges he faces and so we place ourselves in his shoes.
This would be a great book for children facing challenges and transitions similar to Mark’s. It’s an emotional and difficult change for many reasons and this book may help to ease some fears and help children see that they are not alone.
Visit the Multicultural Children’s Book Day page to find more reviews of diverse books for children!
I do appreciate books that are open-ended enough in their story lines and characters that all sorts of young readers can insert themselves into the story, and see themselves reflected in the characters.