This is a companion piece to the Community Editorial Board’s Editorial: Our LGBTQ+ youth can’t opt-out of their identity, for their sake and safety we can’t either, which calls for community support for LGBTQ+ youth and education on the LGBTQ+ experience.

The following is a list of resources meant to educate parents, caregivers and allies of LGBTQ+ youth with age-appropriate books, information and more. Email us at [email protected] about any other resources not included and we’ll add them to this list.

The LGBTQ Center of Long Beach has created the above video to provide helpful tips for parents and caregivers of LGBTQ youth. You can also consult the Gay, Lesbian & Straight Education Network, known as GLSEN, for more resources.

The Long Beach Unified School District has provided a list of instructional materials provided to K-5 teachers that are part of the FAIR Education Act of 2011.

Grade K

•         The Big Umbrella
•         Tiera Fletcher
•         Introducing Teddy: A Gentle Story about Gender and Friendship
•         Alma and How She Got Her Name
•         Dreamers

Grade 1

•         Sparkle Boy
•         Early Sunday Morning
•         The Boy & The Bindi
•         Imagine
•         Days With Dad

Grade 2

•         Donovan’s Big Day
•         Cambodian Dancer
•         My Brother Charlie
•         Game Changers
•         Dolores Huerta

Grade 3

•         A Moon for Moe & Mo
•         The Girl Who Thought in Pictures
•         Radiant Child, Lesson Question
•         Mango, Abuela, and Me
•         Mary Wears What She Wants

Grade 4

•         Antsy Ansel: Ansel Adams, A Life In Nature,
•         Mei Ling in China
•         Dorothea’s Eyes
•         Separate is Never Equal
•         PRIDE: The Story of Harvey Milk and the Rainbow Flag

Grade 5

•         The People Shall Continue
•         Freedom Over Me
•         Great Women of the American Revolution
•         The Sound of All Things
•         A Shelter in Our Car