成人快播

Originally posted on聽. By Lauren Schiller.

You can鈥檛 walk into a bookstore these days without being confronted with an onslaught of books empowering girls. You almost could get cynical about it.

Is someone trying to make money off girl power?

Probably.

Are they just revisiting the same聽ol鈥� same聽ol鈥� women we always hear about?

Likely.

But now and then a book pops up that is truly inspiring and, better yet, timely. And even better, written by actual feminists, parents, and educators who want to use their books to incite change by creating role models our daughters and sons can relate to.
Sounds pretty rad, right? That鈥檚 actually the name of a book series. “,”听“,” and this July, Kate Schatz and her co-author the rad Miriam Klein Stahl are out with a third book called “.”
Because as聽rad聽as those other books聽were, they all featured mostly adults.

This book is all girl.

I was able to talk with Kate and Miriam at a benefit for children’s literacy hosted by 成人快播, an organization that mobilizes communities across the California Bay Area to help students read at grade level by fourth grade.

I was blown away to find out that nationwide only 35 percent of incoming fourth graders can read at grade-level proficiency or above. And without these skills by fourth grade, students are four times more likely to聽dropout聽of high school.

So we started our conversation about the books that inspired a lifelong love of reading.

鈥淢y mom worked in a children’s bookstore where I grew up in San Jose,鈥� Kate told me. 鈥淭here was this old claw-foot bathtub full of pillows. And she put me in this old聽bath tub聽of pillows and give me a stack of books and then she would go work the register and sell children’s books. And I that’s where I taught myself to read.鈥�

Reading in a bathtub in a kids’ bookstore introduced Kate to titles like “Harriet the Spy” and “The Island of the Blue Dolphins,” in which girls took the lead and ran with it.

鈥淚 gravitated towards stories about strong, adventurous, independent girls, which is what I wanted to be,鈥� she said. 鈥淭he book series that really rocked my world was the Anastasia Krupnick books by Lois Lowry and it is literally where I first encountered the word 鈥榝eminist.鈥欌��

Now Kate and Miriam are introducing more kids to strong, adventurous, independent girls with their series of Rad Women and Rad Girls books.

Harriet the Spy would be proud.

Listen to my on-stage discussion with Kate and Miriam recorded live for聽.

And when you鈥檙e done, come on over to聽, our Facebook group of everyday activists who seek to make extraordinary change through small, daily actions.

Subscribe to “Inflection Point” to get more stories of how women rise up right in your feed on聽,听,听听补苍诲听.

If you want to help elementary schools with one-on-one reading support, consider becoming a volunteer or donating to聽, a national nonprofit that helps students with the one-on-one tutoring they need to read at grade level by fourth grade.