Books for Teaching about Diwali

Hi! Today I wanted to share some of my favorite books for teaching about Diwali. Diwali is such a special holiday, celebrated by Indian and East Asian families all over the world. If you’re looking to do a Diwali unit in your classroom, be sure to check out my Holidays unit.

Diwali celebrates “good over evil,” and is often called the “Festival of Lights.”

If you’d like to learn more about Diwali, I’d encourage you to check out these blogs.
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The Diwali Gift by Shweta Chopra and Shuchi Mehta
This book is about 3 curious monkeys, Suno, Dekho, and Jaano. They receive a special gift on their doorstep to celebrate the holiday. The gift is a mystery, and they are so excited to figure it out. This is a great book to introduce the holiday. It does a great job introducing some important Diwali vocabulary words for students to learn about and discuss.

Binny’s Diwali by Thrity Umrigar
This book is so pretty. I love the illustrations! In this book, Binny, is supposed to share her favorite holiday with the class…Diwali. This book is super engaging, but it still does a great job explaining how families celebrate Diwali. If you can only get one book…I’d get this one!

Archie Celebrates Diwali by Mitali Banerjee Ruths
Similar to Binny, Archie is tasked with sharing about Diwali with her classmates. Unfortunately, there’s a big storm and the power goes out. A sweet book about making the best of a situation!

Celebrate the World: Diwali by Hannah Eliot
This book is actually a board book, and I have the whole series for my daughter. Even though it’s in board book form, it’s still super informative for elementary students. I definitely recommend having this series in your classroom library, and the illustrations are beautiful.
**Disclaimer…this book was not written by a native or authentic voice. I still think its’ a great book, but if you are only purchasing one…I would choose a book written by someone who celebrates Diwali.

5 Days of Diwali by Ajanta Chakraborty
This is a great book that explains the 5 days of Diwali, and how families celebrate this special holiday. It’s actually part of a series that incldues books about Ramadan, Eid, Holi and several other important days and holidays.

Shubh Diwali by Chitra Soundar
I love this book for it’s cute illustrations, and simple text. It is less of a story and more of an informative text, but it’s still “sing songy” enough to keep young learners super engaged. I really love that this book includes multi-generations, because that will be familiar to so many of our students.

Peppa’s Diwali
Finally, Peppa’s Diwali. Usually I’m not a huge fan of using character books as read alouds…often they’re just not super well written. But they’re a great way to engage students…especially with new topics. If you have a Peppa love in your class or at home, this would be a good addition.