Chicken Sunday by Patricia Polacco (1998, Paperback, Reprint)

I use this wonderful book every year in my classroom. Teaching in an urban district, I have to teach many lessons on kindness and acceptance. This book, in which the author tells a story from her childhood demonstrates the love between these friends from different religious and racial brackgrounds who have a misunderstanding with an old Jewish man, Mr. Kadinski. In the end, everything works out, and the children and the man come away with a new respect for one another. This is also a convienient segway into the Holocaust, as Mr. Kadinski has numbers tattooed on his arm as a clue as to what he's been through. My students always enjoy this book, and it always leads to wonderful discussions.