You Are (Not) Small
Ages 4 to 8A second grade teacher used it with her class and says her students saw their own shouting arguments in it and watched their view of big and small shift.
Recommended by Great Kid Books
Ages 4 to 7The Sandwich Swap
Ages 4 to 7About this age guidance
Kirkus: 4–7; Publishers Weekly: 3–7
The age tag follows Kirkus review. Other sources may suggest different ages. This is audience guidance, not an independent reading level.
Picked for a librarian’s conflict resolution list as a story for conflicts caused by differences, misunderstandings and hurtful words, where one comment about a lunch grows into a group fight and then amends.
Best friends Lily and Salma fall out when each calls the other’s sandwich yucky. Classmates take sides and a food fight follows. Ashamed, the girls taste each other’s lunch the next day, like it, and return to the principal with a plan for a shared picnic.
Recommended by Children’s Library Lady
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What children see in the story
Each girl is sure the other’s lunch is gross until she tastes it. Both change their minds after trying it, and the change leads to a plan to share foods from many places. After the food fight the girls feel ashamed. They make things right with each other by trying each other’s lunch, then bring the principal a plan to share.
Why it’s on these shelves
- Open-mindedness
- Lily and Salma each decide the other’s lunch looks yucky. After a food fight, they taste each other’s sandwiches, find both delicious, and change their minds.
- Making things right
- Lily and Salma feel ashamed after the food fight lands them in the principal’s office. They make up by trying each other’s lunch, then take the principal an idea to share, a long table of foods from many places.
Why pick it up?
The friends make up by tasting each other’s food and propose sharing; an author’s note says the story came from a childhood incident.
A note for parents
Didactic warning: Publishers Weekly says message trumps realism, calls the themes readily apparent and the story well intentioned if predictable. It is not a story that reads as a lesson alone, but David should see this. Kirkus notes the picnic table flags leave out Israel, which it calls a missed opportunity. The author, Queen Rania of Jordan, is a public figure. The mix of two small insults and a food fight is brief, but the middle of the book is conflict. Resolution is quick.
Where this recommendation comes from
Children’s Library Lady
Picked for a librarian’s conflict resolution list as a story for conflicts caused by differences, misunderstandings and hurtful words, where one comment about a lunch grows into a group fight and then amends.
Read Children’s Library Lady’s recommendationSources and review status
We have checked source descriptions and drafted the value mapping. We have not personally reviewed the full book. The value labels, situation assignments, and parent notes remain provisional.
Publisher or literacy resource · Original recommendation
Our explanation of the value fit is separate from the original reviewer’s judgment. Their inclusion here does not imply an endorsement of Stories for Growing.
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Drawn Together
Ages 4 to 8Listed on a librarian’s picture book list for open-mindedness. The librarian says a boy and his grandfather, who share no common language, move from frustrating silence to shared storytelling through art.
Recommended by Children’s Library Lady