you are a teacher or librarian interested in children’s literature, or a writer of adult books who is now considering writing a book for children, or someone in another related occupation. You keep this blog to track and share your professional development and expertise.
Write a blog entry about your first explorations into this topic, based in personal experience and observation as described below, and helped by reference to at least three unit readings to frame your ideas and help to answer questions or shape your interests. You may use an informal or conversational tone, but do provide citations and bibliographic information.
First, thinking of yourself as a child, choose a certain book that captivated you. Read it again and comment on your response: whether the narrative is as you recalled, what narrative elements may have changed or been enhanced in memory, and what aspects of its framing in society now strike you. See, for example, Shirley Brice Heath’s What No Bedtime Story Means: Narrative Skills at Home and School, about culture and class factors. Next, observe a child engaging in a book and ask them why it is appealing, note how they relate the main features of the narrative, and comment on the level of narrative competence that they exhibit. Here you may want to use one of the frameworks discussed in Nancy Marshall’s Using Story Grammar to Assess Reading Comprehension or in another of your course readings.
