Children's literature aimed at young children poses a unique challenge for an individual attempting to analyze a work of fiction. Normally, the student of fiction can quote from the text with a reasonable expectation that the attitude of the text can be conveyed to the reader of the essay. Simply by reading the selected, quoted passage the reader of the essay ought to get a sense of the book. However, when discussing a picture book, conveying the tone of a work becomes more difficult because the illustrations and the words are inexorably linked. Often, to a very young or pre-literate child reading the book, the pictures are even more important than the words.
The Stinky Cheese Man and Other Fairly Stupid Tales (featuring "Little Red Running Shorts" as one of its tales) was written by Jon Sciezka and illustrated by Lance Smith. It is an interesting example of this phenomenon of how in much of children's literature; a text cannot be separated by the illustrations that accompany it. It is an elaborately illustrated picture book, and the illustrations critically impact the way that the reader experiences the text. It is also a parody of certain elements of children's literature and of fables and thus it contains elements that can only be understood by an adult. The jokes both function on a literal level that pander to children and delights children with grossness and misbehavior. It also delights adults in the cleverness it shows in making fun of the morality of children's tales. Yet for both children and adults, they must see what is depicted as well as read the words to understand the book's intentions.
Reading to children is often thought of as an intellectually or morally 'improving' activity. But The Stinky...
For instance, in Jacob Have I Loved, a twin comes of age in the 1940s, and finds that she indeed can make ordinary life more than extraordinary. Realistic fiction also tends to be more contemporary in tone, connecting with issues that are relevant to contemporary family situations. Issues such as divorce, dysfunctional families, adoptions, etc. are dealt with in a serious and relevant manner; in On My Honor, a
Charlotte's Web: Field Research, Psycho-Social Research, and a Textual Summary and Analysis Introduction and Field Research Background My niece Ariel, age 11, agreed to read Charlotte's Web by E.B. White with me, and to be my informant on this project (Shapiro, "Personal Interview"). Ariel is extremely bright (IQ over 140), and has already finished the 7th grade, having skipped second grade in elementary school (I bring this up not so much to
Child Abuse in Literature Child Maltreatment Child maltreatment entails all types of neglect and abuse of a child below eighteen years by caregivers, parents or any other person (Crosson-Tower, 2006). Child abuse encompasses all forms of physical abuse, emotional abuse, sexual abuse, neglect or child exploitation that causes potential or actual harm to a child's well-being, dignity and development (Smith & Fong, 2004). According to Scannapieco & Connell-Carrick (2005), child maltreatment is
Child Abuse "Although it is extremely important when interviewing children about alleged abuse to determine whether the abuse was single or repeated… we have little information about how children judge the frequency of events… [and] overall children were very accurate at judging the frequency of a single event, but much less so for repeated events." (Sharman, et al., 2011). Department of Health & Human Services (HHS) reports that in the year 2010
Children's Lit Montano urges a rigorous critical examination of children's literature for racism, linguicism, sexism, and bias. The importance of critical examination is to empower teachers, students, and parents to recognize the root causes of bias, prejudice, and stereotype. The function is not simply to point out obvious instances of racism, linguicism, sexism, and other biases. Moreover, it is not enough to include literature written from multicultural perspectives in classroom syllabi.
Children's Literature "All work and no play makes Jack a dull boy." This adage takes on various meanings according to context -- in the early twenty-first century, it will most likely be used to imply too much seriousness about schoolwork. But in the consideration of children's literature in the nineteenth century, we face the prospect of a society where child labor was actually a fact of life. We are familiar with
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