Nusaiba and the 5th Grade Bullies Paperback – January 1, 2016

I thought this would be an excellent story for my 2nd grade and 5th grade granddaughters who like to stand up against bullies. But better than that, the story line covers not only Nusaiba's feelings about the bullies, but also her sharing adventures in imagination with her best friend and caring for her mom's feelings. At the end she and her mom and the bullies experience a special surprise ending. The artwork is beautiful and the discussion questions at the end of the book are great conversation starters. God willing, I want to donate this book to the school's library this fall.

This book defies stereotypes! Want a book with a strong female heroine for your children, then this book is for you. The little girl is Nusaiba; I absolutely love her name, named after an amazing strong sahabiya who actually physically defended the Prophet (pbuh) against harm in a battle!She hears fifth graders snickering and assumes they are making fun of her mothers hijab, which makes her sad.The book is illustrated beautifully with pictures showing her picking out her own special hijab, each hijab taking her on an adventure.The highlight is when Nusaiba defends her mother against the bullies, and shows her pride in her islamic identity! Such important character building for our children!Something I absolutely loved:Her mother has such a cool career, and you must read the book to figure out what it is !

i relly like the story and illustrations. I read this to my 6 yrs old daughter but when I read it my 9yrs old son also got interested and loved the book. they wanted me to read the story over and over again. we live in a non-muslim area and they have some concerns about me wearing hijab so this book definitely gives the right perspective.

Lovely story and beautiful illustrations! My daughter has read it so many times and still wants to read it again!

I have 3 kids aged 4, 6, and 8. They were interested in this story and liked it. The soon-to-be 3rd grader is definitely at the age to see bullying happen, so this book came at a good time. I hope that the conversation that this book sparked will help him to be one who stands up to bullying and never partakes in it.As a mom, I liked a few things about this book. The story focused on imagination and learning to love who you are (including your hijab). I thought that was pretty cool. Additionally, I liked that there are focus questions/prompts at the end of the book to help generate thinking, understanding, and conversation about the story. Bullying is such an important topic - not just because we don't want to be victims of bullies, but also because we don't want to be bullies ourselves! Oh and I also liked that there was a bit of twist in the story at the end. Assumptions were wrong and stereotypes were broken in the last few pages. I loved that.

Quality literature that Muslim children can relate to is so hard to find, but this book, mashaAllah, is one that can spark amazing conversations as well children's imagination. I gave this book to my 7 year old cousin as a gift, and when I spoke with her, she excitedly informed me that she had read it three times in one day and wanted to read it to me again. With every page turned, there was something she could relate to as a young Muslim girl living in the United States from being shy about kissing mom on the cheek, to why others might make fun of someone wearing a hijab. The diversity of this book is superb as well and hard to come by in books these days! The surprise at the ending is a great reminder that things aren't always what we assume them to be!

I have read a few kids’ books written by sr.Asma and in the kids section Nusaiba is my favorite book. Love Nusaiba’s imagination with each color of the scarf. Reading her imagination as she and her friend tries each scarf made me travel in her imaginative world. My favorite part of the story is the ending an unexpected plot. Made me laugh and think how we always assume and things aren’t the way we assume them to be. I like the illustrations; they show what is going on well. The end of the book has few open ended questions that you can use with kids to share their reflection/ lessons learned.

I bought this book for my boys because bullying has become so prevalent and I wanted to talk them about it and wanted to use this as a conversation starter. My 7 year old has read this book about 8 times in the span of 3 days and my 6 year old has read it 4 times just in one day. They're able to relate to the character, Nusaiba because of her religious identity and because her mother wears a scarf. I'm a elementary school teacher and will be ordering another copy for my classroom library. This is quality literature!