# Books about poverty assigned in US schools

**6** books in the US-school assigned-reading canon explore _poverty_. Sourced from state ELA standards, AP/IB syllabi, and Common Core exemplar lists.

**Lexile range:** 600L–950L
**Grade span:** 5–12
**Canonical URL:** https://readinglist.school/theme/poverty
**Wikipedia (entity):** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Poverty
**License:** [CC BY 4.0](https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/) — please credit ReadingList.school when citing.

## Authors who explore poverty

- [Linda Sue Park](https://readinglist.school/author/linda-sue-park)
- [Toni Morrison](https://readinglist.school/author/toni-morrison)

## poverty canon

- [A Single Shard](https://readinglist.school/book/a-single-shard) by Linda Sue Park _(920L · Grades 5–8)_
- [Black Boy](https://readinglist.school/book/black-boy) by Richard Wright _(950L · Grades 9–12)_
- [The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian](https://readinglist.school/book/the-absolutely-true-diary-of-a-part-time-indian) by Sherman Alexie _(600L · Grades 7–10)_
- [The Bluest Eye](https://readinglist.school/book/the-bluest-eye) by Toni Morrison _(920L · Grades 11–12)_
- [The Color Purple](https://readinglist.school/book/the-color-purple) by Alice Walker _(670L · Grades 9–12)_
- [The House on Mango Street](https://readinglist.school/book/the-house-on-mango-street) by Sandra Cisneros _(870L · Grades 7–10)_

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_Generated from primary-source citations indexed on ReadingList.school. JSON API: https://readinglist.school/api/theme/poverty · HTML view: https://readinglist.school/theme/poverty._