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Barbara Belford

Born: 1954 in Ann Arbor, Michigan
Pen Name: Bibi Belford

Connection to Illinois: Belford grew up in Wheaton, Illinois, then lived in Aurora and Batavia for 33 years and just recently moved to Chicago.

Biography: Barbara Belford graduated with a B.A. in English and an education minor from Westmont College in California, then completed a masters of Bilingual Literacy and an ESL endorsement at Northern Illinois University. She has been a teacher in District 131, East Aurora, for her entire career, as a classroom teacher, reading specialist, and literacy coach.


Awards:

Primary Literary Genre(s): Fiction

Primary Audience(s): Children; Young adult readers

Twitter: https://twitter.com/barbarabelford
Website: http://www.bibibelford.com


Selected Titles

Another D for DeeDee /
ISBN: 1510724060 OCLC: 981991110

"DeeDee's life is full of D's. Missing her dad, who's disappeared. Distracted by her sister's quinceañera and her brother dropping out of high school. Disappointing her family by struggling in her new school. Being diagnosed with diabetes. So many D's she worries she'll never fit in, and worse, never find the best friend she's always wanted. Then she meets River, her new neighbor with cochlear implants and finds they have the same interests. Art. Dance. Skateboarding. And they both miss their dads. But while DeeDee struggles to adjust to her new circumstances and life with diabetes, River embraces life, even his differences. River offers to help search for DeeDee's dad and coach her in skateboarding and the two become friends. River even encourages her to participate in her school's Spring Fling talent show. Then River transfers to DeeDee's new school. Instead of sticking up for him and risking being made fun of, DeeDee makes mistake after mistake until she's forced to decide: keep the best friend she's always wanted by standing up to her classmates, or stay silent and lose River forever? Before DeeDee can be a good friend she must learn to love differences--not just River's but also her own" --

Canned and crushed /
ISBN: 1632204355 OCLC: 884815081

When his father, who is in the United States illegally, becomes injured and unemployed, eleven-year-old Sandro is determined to help his parents raise money for his little sister's heart surgery by collecting scrap metal to recycle for cash.

Crossing the line /
ISBN: 1510708006 OCLC: 1001287562

Fifth-grader Billy must transfer from his all-white, Catholic school to a public school, where he becomes best friends with Foster, who is black, just before the Red Summer of 1919.

 

 

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