If you’re looking to boost your lesson plans with great reads and important classroom discourse, we have a selection of guides to help! This list of teacher’s guides for every occasion can help you plan for the year! From well-loved canon to important historical moments, you’ll find pre-reading questions, discussion topics, and common core ties that are evergreen conversation starters.
New guides are highlighted!
| Watch our Macmillan Children’s Publishing Group Winter 2027 Preview Event, where we previewed upcoming picture books, middle grade, and young adult titles during this one hour webinar. Stay tuned for our live special guest! Marla Frazee was in conversation about her new picture book, Stand-Up Duck, a story about resilience, trying again, and finding community with people who lift you up. We also had guest video appearances from talented creators Zeke Peña (The Junk Box), Kristen Mai Giang (Lian Song Unlocks Real-Life Secret Powers), John Leguizamo (American History, the Latin Remix), and Hafsah Faizal (Blade of Honey). |
Timestamps:
14:59 – Picture Books
13:00 – Author video from Zeke Peña for The Junk Box
19:03 – Middle Grade
20:43 – Author video from John Leguizamo for American History, the Latin Remix
23:55 – Author video from Kristen Mai Giang for the Lian Song chapter book series
34:35 – Young Adult
38:40 – Author video from Hafsah Faizal for Blade of Honey
45:40 – Live Guest: Author Marla Frazee, Stand-Up Duck, in conversation with SVP and co-publisher at Balzer+Bray, Donna Bray
The hopes of humanity rest on the shoulders of one chess player in this true graphic novel about the chess match between a human and a super computer, by bestselling author Steve Sheinkin, Chess Grandmaster Maurice Ashley, and award-winning comics artist Thien Pham.
It’s May 1997 in Manhattan, New York. World champion Garry Kasparov is about to begin a six-game match against Deep Blue, the cutting-edge super computer developed by a team of visionaries at IBM. No machine has ever defeated a chess champion in a multi-game match.
If it happens, it will be a major turning point in human history. It will be, as Newsweek declares on its cover, “the Brain’s Last Stand.”
Will the human mind prevail? Or is this checkmate for humankind?
Told through three-time National Book Award finalist Steve Sheinkin’s gripping storytelling and first-hand accounts from Chess Grandmaster Maurice Ashley, with riveting illustrations by Eisner winner Thien Pham (Family Style: A Memoir), this nail-biting narrative captures the excitement and suspense of a classic sports showdown and explores thought-provoking themes about where humanity stands at the rise of AI.
Our Graphic Novel Preview series invites readers to look inside new graphic novels! This month, we’re highlighting Mind vs. Machine: The Chess Match That Changed the World, written by Steve Sheinkin and Maurice Ashley; illustrated by Thien Pham. Mind vs. Machine is the true story of an epic chess match that changed the world. On sale 9/8/26!
Scroll to find preview spreads, download a guide for How to Start a Chess Club, and request the book on Netgalley to read the full story!
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Our Graphic Novel Preview series invites readers to look inside new graphic novels! This month, we’re highlighting When a Tiger Flies by Susie Yi. This graphic novel explores a teen’s first love in college, the toxic relationship she becomes trapped in, and the intergenerational strength that gives her the courage to break free. On sale 2/16/27!
Scroll to find preview spreads and request the book on Netgalley to read the full story!
Read More »
Celebrate Native American Heritage Month in your school or library! Keep reading to find more book recommendations, to download resources for your classroom—including a teacher’s guide for Together We See, and an activity kit for Autumn Peltier, Water Warrior—and hear from H.E. Edgmon about their middle grade novel The Flicker!
Read More »Browse all of our October new releases, including new picture books, middle grade, young adult, adult, graphic novels, and paperbacks!
October is National Bullying Prevention Month. Looking for suggestions for titles that encourage kindness, empathy, and understanding in your classroom or library?
Read on for a list of titles for every age reader, plus take a deeper dive on three standout titles: One Word, Six Letters, Weirdo, and Accountable: The True Story of a Racist Social Media Account and the Teenagers Whose Lives It Changed.
