Kids & Immigration

Two Latino/a Children’s Books

Ours is, largely, an immigrant nation: its citizens having ultimately come from Germany, Ireland, Italy, and Vietnam; from Polish shtetls, Scandinavian farms, Khymer communities, and countless other places. In that regard, it is worth noticing the remarkable fact that the story of immigration is often a memoir about childhood (think of Frank McCourt’s Angela’s Ashes, for example) and frequently a story for children. There seems a vital link between a story of childhood and the immigrant experience.

In his prize-winning The Circuit, Francisco Jiménez tells how his family crossed the border and came from Mexico to California in the 1950s. They labored as migrant farm workers, living in the growers’ camp, picking vegetables and fruit and cotton. Beset by poverty and illness, the family survived by togetherness. And whenever there was time, young Francisco would go to school. There he encountered problems until he could become proficient in English; and there he was helped by the best kind of teachers, those who compassionately paid attention (devoting their lunch hours to language lessons and providing a coat when they noticed him shivering).

In this memoir’s collection of stories, the very best are subtle parables. “Inside Out,” for example, tells how, feeling lost in the first grade at an English-speaking…