Everybody Cooks Rice

Everybody Cooks Rice

Dooley, N. (1991). Everybody cooks rice. Minneapolis: Carolrhoda Books.

On her way to find her little brother for dinner, Carrie samples each family's dinner in her neighborhood. She goes door to door and finds that everyone is cooking dinner and Anthony had been there sampling some of their food. Carrie lives in a diverse neighborhood with people from India, China, Haiti, Puerto Rico, Vietnam, and Barbados among others. She returns home to find her brother there and realizes that everyone cooks rice in their own special way in her neighborhood. By the time she tracks down her brother, Carrie has discovered a world of rice dishes in her own backyard. This book is a terrific picture book about culture acceptance. The seemingly simple plot line, gives way for an important moral lesson. 

This book would be good for all ages. For younger grades it could be used to study immigration and the idea that being different is not a bad thing. In older grades, it could be used as a lesson for acceptance and understanding. As stated, this book would be good to use when teaching about immigration. It could be included in a unit about immigration and used for a mini lesson about the effects of immigration in modern society. Also, I loved the illustrations in this book  because they allowed for a constant theme, home, to be contrasted with the varying appearances of family; simple, but effective. 

Here are some other multicultural books!