She received many awards for her writing. For "M. C. Higgins, the Great", a tale of a black boy growing up poor in the South, she won the U.S. National Book Award and the Newbery Medal in 1975. For lifetime achievement, she won the international Hans Christian Andersen Award for writing children's literature in 1992 and a Laura Ingalls Wilder Medal in 1995. Because of the racial discrimination against African Americans during her lifetime, her achievements are especially important.