This book correlates English-speaking children's brain development and acquisition of language with the linguistic input that comes from children's books. Drawing from the most current research on the developing brain, the author demonstrates how language acquisition is exclusively interactive, and highlights the benefit that accrues when that interaction includes the exploratory language play found in early childhood literature. Through discussions of specific domains of grammar, the relation of these domains to children's literature through scaffolding, and the resultant linguistic and cognitive advantages for the child, this volume offers an innovative approach to early brain maturation.

Voices of the Other offers a variety of approaches to children's literature that includes discussions of cultural appropriation, race theory, pedagogy as a colonialist activity, and multiculturalism. The 18 essays divide into three sections: Theory, Colonialism, and Postcolonialism. Section 1 sets the theoretical framework for postcolonial studies, while section 2 presents discussions of the colonialist mind-set in children's and young adult's texts from 1900 onward. Here, works by writers of animal stories in Canada, The US, and Britain, works of early Australian colonialist literature, and Burnett's A little Princess are scrutinized through postmodern readings. Section 3 deals directly with contemporary texts for children that manifest both a postcolonial and a neocolonial content, and features studies of children's literature from Canada, Australia, Africa, The Caribbean, and The United States.

In this new monograph, author Debra Dudek defines a new era of vampire texts in which vampires have moved from their iconic dark, feared, often seductive figure lingering in alleys, to the beloved and morally sensitive vampire winning the affections of teen protagonists throughout pop culture. Dudek takes a close look at three hugely-popular vampire series for young adults, drawing parallels between the TV series Buffy the Vampire Slayer, the Twilight Saga novels/films, and The Vampire Diaries TV series/book series. By defining a new era of vampire texts and situating these three series within this transition, The Beloved Does Not Bite signals their significance and lays the groundwork for future scholarship on the flourishing genre of paranormal romances for young adults.

This text features a collection of interviews with some contemporary children's writers. Authors such as Neil Ardley, Ian Beck, Helen Cresswell, Gillian Cross, Terry Deary, Berlie Doherty, Brian Moses, Alan Durant, Philip Pullman, Celia Rees, Norman Silver, Jacqueline Wilson and Benjamin Zephaniah talk about the joys and challenges, rewards and demands of the craft, creativity and process of writing for children. By discussing issues such as how the authors approach their writing on a daily basis, how they view the writing process, and how they perceive their visits to schools, this book will enable teachers to gain new ideas on ways to work with these authors' writings in relation to the literacy hour.; After a general introduction, each monologue is divided into individual sections, in which the writer talks about: their reading habits as children and adults; how they came to be published; how they approach their writing on a daily basis; how they view the writing process; the evolution of their titles - either books or poems; how they perceive their visits to schools, and finally, in a "specialist subject" section, the authors explore an issue of interest related to their work.

Series Information:
Children's Literature and Culture

This book offers a comprehensive analysis of character focalization in ten contemporary realistic children's novels. The author argues that character focalization, defined as the location of fictional world perception in the mind of a character, is a prominent textual structure in these novels. He demonstrates how significant meanings are conveyed in a variety of forms related to characters' personal and interpersonal experiences. Through close analysis of each text, moreover, he exposes distinctive perceptual, psychological, and social-psychological patterns in the opening chapters of each novel, which are thereafter developed by the principles of continuation, augmentation, and reconfiguration. This book will appeal to scholars, teachers, and students in the fields of narrative studies, stylistics, children's literature scholarship, linguistics, and education.

In 1922, Mildred Pitts Walter was born in DeRidder, Louisiana, to a log cutter and a midwife/beautician. She became the first member of her family to go to college, graduating in 1940. Walter moved to California, where she worked as an elementary school teacher. After being encouraged by a Publisher to write books for and about African American children, Walter went on to become a pioneer of African American children's literature. Most notably, she wrote Justin and the Best Biscuits in the World, which bent preconceptions with tales of black cowboys and men doing "women's work." She was also a contributing book reviewer to the Los Angeles Times. In Something Inside So Strong: Life in Pursuit of Choice, Courage, and Change, Walter recollects major touchstones in her life. The autobiography, divided into three parts, "Choice," "Courage," and "Change," covers Walter's life beginning with her childhood in the 1920s and moving to the present day. In "Choice," Walter describes growing up in a deeply segregated Louisiana and includes memories of school, rural home life, World War II, and participating in neighborhood activities like hog killing and church revivals. "Courage" documents her adjustment to living away from family, her experiences teaching in Los Angeles and her extensive work with her husband for the Los Angeles chapter of the Congress of Racial Equality. The final section, "Change," shows how Walter's writing and activism merged, detailing her work as an education consultant and as an advocate for nonviolent resistance to racism. It also reveals how her world travels expanded her personal inquiry into Christianity and African spirituality. Something Inside So Strong is one woman's journey to self-discovery.

Using examples of The Tale of Peter Rabbit by Beatrix Potter to explore the impact of new media and technologies on how children learn about stories and reading, this book investigates nearly 100 re-tellings in a variety of media, some authorized by Potter's publisher Frederick Warne, some unauthorized. It looks at the implications of converging developments in children's literature:
*new media and technologies now readily available to children leading to new conventions and protocols of storytelling
*changing commercial pressures on publishers and an emphasis on producing commodities associated with books and videos
*saturation marketing which targets children and adults in different ways
*and a cultural emphasis on the fragmentation, adaptation, and re-working of texts.
The Tale of Peter Rabbit is now available as picture book, chapter book, board and bath book, pop-up, video (in versions that adhere to the original story and versions that deviate radically to include "new adventures" or Christan messages), ballet, CD-Rom, computer disc, audio tape and filmstrip.
The character of Peter Rabbit may be purchased as toy, clothing, dish, ornament, wallpaper, food, paper doll, and much else. His story and that of his author, Beatrix Potter, reappear in fragmented form in other books for children, in a murder mystery for adults and in a graphic novel for teenagers. This book raises questions about the impact of these developments on young readers.

eBook available with sample pages: HB:0815330944

Talking Books sets out to show how some of the leading children's authors of the day respond to these and other similar questions. The authors featured are Neil Ardley, Ian Beck, Helen Cresswell, Gillian Cross, Terry Deary, Berlie Doherty, Alan Durant, Brian Moses, Philip Pullman, Celia Rees, Norman Silver, Jacqueline Wilson, and Benjamin Zephaniah.
They discuss with great enthusiasm:
*their childhood reading habits
*how they came to be published
*how they write on a daily basis
*how a particular book came together
*a type of writing that they are especially known for.
Through in-depth interviews, they each reveal their approach to their craft. Much is know and spoken of the product that is the children's book, but it is rare that writers are given the opportunity to talk at length about the process of writing for children. Talking Books redresses the balance by presenting a wide selection of authors (of fiction, non-fiction and poetry) reflecting upon the joys and challenges of the craft, creativity and process of writing for children.

Contents:
Introduction 1. Reading at different ages 2. Favourite books Endpiece: Roald Dahl and Enid Blyton 3. Periodical reading Endpiece: Teenage magazines 4. Boy's and Girls' reading Endpiece: gender, reading development and school 5. The influence of family background 6. Children's reading habits 7. Television, computer use and reading 8. Changes in children's reading habits over time Endpiece: questions of quality and children's reading development
Appendix 1 The questionnaire Appendix 2 Project procedures Appendix 3 Categories and coding Appendix 4 The interview schedule

This book introduces the major works and debates in Chinese children's literature within the framework of China's revolution and modernization. It demonstrates that the guiding rationale in children's literature was the political importance of children as the nation's future.

Raising key questions about race, class, sexuality, age, material culture, intellectual history, pedagogy, and gender, this book explores the myriad relationships between feminist thinking and "Little Women".

This chronological guide to the developmental stages, and corresponding literary needs and preferences, of early childhood is hte unique result of combinging the expertise of educational professionals with that of a children's librarian. Each chapter describes a developmental stage of childhood and presents appropriate books for that reading level, providing expert guidance in today's crowded children's book market.

Using examples of The Tale of Peter Rabbit by Beatrix Potter to explore the impact of new media and technologies on how children learn about stories and reading, this book investigates nearly 100 re-tellings in a variety of media, some authorized by Potter's publisher Frederick Warne, some unauthorized. It looks at the implications of converging developments in children's literature:
*new media and technologies now readily available to children leading to new conventions and protocols of storytelling
*changing commercial pressures on publishers and an emphasis on producing commodities associated with books and videos
*saturation marketing which targets children and adults in different ways
*and a cultural emphasis on the fragmentation, adaptation, and re-working of texts.
The Tale of Peter Rabbit is now available as picture book, chapter book, board and bath book, pop-up, video (in versions that adhere to the original story and versions that deviate radically to include "new adventures" or Christan messages), ballet, CD-Rom, computer disc, audio tape and filmstrip.
The character of Peter Rabbit may be purchased as toy, clothing, dish, ornament, wallpaper, food, paper doll, and much else. His story and that of his author, Beatrix Potter, reappear in fragmented form in other books for children, in a murder mystery for adults and in a graphic novel for teenagers. This book raises questions about the impact of these developments on young readers.

eBook available with sample pages: 0203305213

First published in 1992, this book will be an invaluable help to librarians, teachers and parents looking for quality information books for children. Four Hundred and Seventy titles have been selected by an experienced team of reviewers for young people between the ages 3 and 16. Written by teachers and librarians, each review includes full bibliographical details, a succinct assessment of the book and an indication of reader age range. The subjects covered take into account the requirements of the National Curriculum. All areas of knowledge are covered, but no attempt was made to find recommended titles in all subjects - the quality of the book with a specific topic, author or title in mind, detailed subject and author/title indexes are supplied.

Reception studies have transformed the classics. Many more literary and cultural texts are now regarded as 'valid' for classical study. And within this process of widening, children's literature has in its turn emerged as being increasingly important. Books written for children now comprise one of the largest and most prominent bodies of texts to engage with the classical world, with an audience that constantly changes as it grows up. This innovative volume wrestles with that very characteristic of change which is so fundamental to children's literature, showing how significant the classics, as well as classically-inspired fiction and verse, have been in tackling the adolescent challenges posed by metamorphosis. Chapters address such themes as the use made by C S Lewis, in The Horse and his Boy, of Apuleius' The Golden Ass; how Ovidian myth frames the Narnia stories; classical 'nonsense' in Edward Lear; Pan as a powerful symbol of change in children's literature, for instance in The Wind in the Willows; the transformative power of the Orpheus myth; and how works for children have handled the teaching of the classics.

What happens to traditional stories when they are retold in another time and cultural cotntext and for a different audience? This first-of-its-kind study discusses Bible stories, classical myths, herioc legends, Arthurian romances, Robin Hood lore, folk tales, 'oriental' tales, and other stories derived from European cultures. One chapter is devoted to various retellings of classics, from Shakespeare to "Wind in the Willows."
The authors offer a general theory of what motivates the retelling of stories, and how stories express the aspirations of a society. An important function of stories is to introduce children to a cultural heritage, and to transmit a body of shared allusions and experiences that expresses a society's central values and assumptions. However, the cultural heritage may be modified through a pervasive tendency of retellings to produce socially convervative outcomes because of ethnocentric, androcentric and class-based assumptions in the source stories that persist into retellings. Therefore, some stories, such as classical myths, are particularly resistant to feminist reinterpretations, for example, while other types, such as folktales, are more malleable. In examining such possibilites, the book evaluates the processes of interpretation apparent in retellings.

Drawing on critical race theory, critical race feminism, critical multicultural analysis, and intertextuality this book examines how slavery is represented in contemporary children's picture books. Through analysis of recently published picture books about slavery, Rogers discusses how these books engage with and respond to the historiography of the institution of slavery. Exploring how contemporary writers and illustrators have represented the institution of slavery, Rogers presents a critical and responsible approach for reading and using picture books in K-12 classrooms and demonstrates how these picture books about slavery continue to perform important cultural work.

While we owe much to twentieth and twenty-first century researchers' careful studies of children's linguistic and dramatic play, authors of literature, especially children's literature, have matched and even anticipated these researchers in revealing play's power-authors well aware of the way children use play to experiment with their position in the world. This volume explores the work of authors of literature as well as film, both those who write for children and those who use children as their central characters, who explore the empowering and subversive potentials of children at play. Play gives children imaginative agency over limited lives and allows for experimentation with established social roles; play's disruptive potential also may prove dangerous not only for children but for the society that restricts them.

This book sets out to explore the structure and meanings within the most popular of all literary genres - the adventure story. Deconstructing the Hero offers analytical readings of some of the most widely read adventure stories such as Treasure Island, the James Bond stories and Star Wars. The book describes how adventure stories are influential in shaping children's perception and establishing values.
When many of these stories define non-white, non-European people as inferior, and women as marginal or incapable, we should be worried about what they are teaching our children to think. Margery Hourihan shows how teaching children to read books critically can help to prevent the establishment of negative attitudes, discourage aggression and promote values of emotion and creativity.

This book sets out to explore the structure and meanings within the most popular of all literary genres - the adventure story. Deconstructing the Hero offers analytical readings of some of the most widely read adventure stories such as Treasure Island , the James Bond stories and Star Wars. The book describes how adventure stories are influential in shaping children's perception and establishing values.
When many of these stories define non-white, non-European people as inferior, and women as marginal or incapable, we should be worried about what they are teaching our children to think. Margery Hourihan shows how teaching children to read books critically can help to prevent the establishment of negative attitudes, discourage aggression and promote values of emotion and creativity.

From Jo March of Little Women (1868) to Katniss Everdeen of The Hunger Games (2008), the American tomboy figure has evolved into an icon of modern girlhood and symbol of female empowerment. Battling Girlhood: Sympathy, Social Justice, and the Tomboy Figure in American Literature traces the development of the tomboy figure from its origins in nineteenth-century sentimental novels to twentieth- and twenty-first-century literature and film.

Ursula A. Kelly draws on radical theories of literacy, culture, identity and pedagogy to frame the culture of pedagogy as it relates to human desire. Examples from (auto) biography, classroom practices and popular media - such as the films "Exotica" and "To Sir With Love" - provide the means by which the author highlights some of the pedagogical dilemmas facing literacy practices which often work to silence the cultural politics of identity and desire.
Schooling Desire reconceptualizes traditional and dominant notions of literacy education and schooling through the lenses of feminist, poststructuralist and cultural theories. It focuses on the structuring of desire, pleasure, and longing within the experiences and practices of schooling, pushing discussions of literacy into new terrains.

"Opening the Nursery Door" is a fascinating collection of essays inspired by the discovery of a tiny archive: the nursery library of Jane Johnson 1707-1759, wife of a Lincolnshire vicar. It has captured the scholarly interest of social anthropologists, historians, literary scholars, educationalists and archivists as it has opened up a range of questions about the nature of childhood within English cultural life over three centuries: the texts written and read to children, the multifarious ways childhood has been considered, shaped and schooled through literacy practices, and the hitherto ignored role of women educators in early childhood across all classes.

Opening the Nursery Door is a fascinating collection of essays inspired by the discovery of a tiny archive: the nursery library of Jane Johnson 1707-1759, wife of a Lincolnshire vicar. It has captured the scholarly interest of social anthropologists, historians, literary scholars, educationalists and archivists as it has opened up a range of questions about the nature of childhood within English cultural life over three centuries: the texts written and read to children, the multifarious ways childhood has been considered, shaped and schooled through literacy practices, and the hitherto ignored role of women educators in early childhood across all classes.