Educational Value
To be considered substantive, the content of children's literature courses must include two critical elements. One is educational: Children's literature must be seen as a significant educational tool. The other is literary: Children's literature is a valuable, beautiful, and impressive part of literary history and as such is certainly worthy of study and analysis at the university level.
The distinct educational value of children's literature to children's lives has been well documented over the years. I think teacher educators would find it difficult to identify the same level of research support to suggest that any other subject or content area so thoroughly enhances the literacy and academic lives of children. Preservice teachers need exposure to the educational benefits of children's literature and to ways of effectively sharing literature with their students. The course content I feel is necessary for this to happen must include the following elements:
For many, this might seem like an obvious list for most any course in teacher training. We might look at our current children's literature content to see whether these elements are present. They are, aren't they? We all know that the history of children's literature is being taught -- for goodness sake, it's usually the very first chapter in the required textbook. And of course preservice teachers have the opportunity to interact with books -- they're required to read all the award-winners from the past decade, more or less, in 16 weeks. And students obviously deal with pedagogical issues when they develop that good old thematic unit using children's books as the basis. During their capstone field experience, student teaching, preservice teachers can implement their literature-based units with children (unless, of course, their topic was apples and they wind up teaching in the spring when butterflies are the theme).
Sadly, children's literature hardly becomes educationally worthy when the content associated with it looks this shallow. The critical issue for instructors of children's literature then becomes how effectively the elements of history, opportunity, pedagogy, and field experience are being dealt with currently in our courses. Are preservice teachers really learning enough about children's literature to capitalize on its educational benefits with children? My experience tells me no. I have observed enough children's literature courses, attended sufficient International Reading Association presentations, and read and reviewed a large enough variety of articles and books related to the classroom use of children's literature to know that many are still dealing with children's literature in trite, stale, and educationally empty ways. How many pots of pasta will first graders be forced to cook after reading Strega Nona before we ask ourselves, “Why?” Why are they making pots of pasta? What are the educational benefits? Is cooking pasta the real lesson from Strega Nona that we ought to be highlighting with our students?
Preservice teachers cannot be expected to know how to use children's literature as a purposeful and meaningful educational tool unless we teach them well. Surely preservice teachers must do more than deal with the history of children's literature as a simple timeline of events from the invention of the printing press to the proliferation of paperbacks in discount stores. Reading 30 or 100 or even 1000 children's books during a semester only to jot down the characters, setting, and plot on index cards will probably not influence preservice teachers' instructional pedagogy in ways we intend and in ways they need. Likewise, having preservice teachers listen to the children's literature instructor spout off recent winners of the Caldecott and Newbery medals so they can spout them back later for the final exam does little to promote the type of thinking and reflection we want them to develop.
History. Obviously, there is a great deal for preservice teachers to learn about children's literature that is educationally valuable and academically rigorous. For example, preservice teachers do need to learn that the history and evolution of children's literature over four centuries -- from stories heavily laden with didactic moral lessons to adventure stories and so on -- have paralleled changes in society, politics, and education. They need to understand that children's books published today are not exactly like the stories they read as children, but that there are constant classics that each generation enjoys.
Preservice teachers must therefore be encouraged to analyze (not memorize) society's important influences on historic literary milestones, to examine the impact of art, music, science, politics -- and, of course, education. They need to thoughtfully weigh, both in a historic and an educational context, the range of characters, themes, and perspectives presented in literature for children over time. For example, they need to understand the repercussions of the 1962 publication of The Snowy Day, before which there had been few children's stories written and illustrated with African American characters. They should evaluate the current availability of books that represent minorities and diverse perspectives. They should consider whether Cinderella is blatantly sexist or a timeless classic. They need to gain perspective about the differences between the lessons subtlety shared within the plots of the Peter Rabbit tales and those didactically imparted in the resolutions of the Berenstain Bears books. Preservice teachers should develop a sense of the influences on the historic progression of illustrators, from Greenaway to Gag to Gammell. They should be having serious discussions about the influence of censorship, from the banning of Shakespeare in 1864 to present-day parental objections to Lois Lowry's The Giver (Donelsson & Nilsen, 1997). And they need to be acquainted with the authors, illustrators, and others (such as educators, curriculum designers, publishers, and censors) who influence children's literature and how it is used in school settings.
Opportunity. Preservice teachers can understand and appreciate this history more effectively, however, as they have the opportunity to select, read, and analyze a wide variety of literature (and relevant technology and related resources) for themselves. Considering the number of children's books from which to choose, particular communities' beliefs about censorship, and the level of demand that literature be used to teach, preservice teachers must learn to distinguish which are the best and most appropriate books to share with their future students. And they really must come to this knowledge themselves. Are the tasteless, gruesome R.L. Stine books to be left on the shelf? Or is there some merit in a book that reluctant readers can't wait to get their hands on? Instructors of children's literature content can either didactically provide their students with lists of “good” and “bad” literature, or they can provide preservice teachers with supportive opportunities to select, read, and analyze literature in order to construct criteria for themselves about how to judge what is great literature for sharing with children.
Rosenblatt's (1976) transactional view of reading supports this need. As readers interact with stories, they find personal and significant ways to relate to characters, settings, and conflicts. “A friend or teacher telling you about a book is not an act of reading -- engagement -- for you, nor is reading a summary an act of experiencing the text...the range of possible readings of a given text is potentially infinite considering the variety of personalities and the breadth of experiences among readers” (Karolides, 1997, pp. 9-10). This changes the role of the instructor from a lecturer to a collaborator. Karolides asserts that “directly or indirectly, the teacher or the textbook's questions and instructions can markedly affect the stance that operates in student transactions [with literature]. Key ingredients are classroom atmosphere and teacher's expectations” (p. 15).
As a collaborator, the role of the children's literature instructor can be to create a classroom atmosphere that encourages and values preservice teachers' choice of readings from a wide range of genres, authors, and illustrators, past and present. Boyd-Batstone (1997) explains that “part of the process of opening up the classroom to self-selection is trusting that students will follow a natural curiosity and impulse. This impulse is at the discretion of the student.... Allowing for students to pursue their interest moves the student from being a passive recipient of knowledge to an active, self-directed learner” (p. 193).
In addition to encouraging students to select a variety of readings, instructors of children's literature must also set high expectations for learning about and analyzing those selections. Analysis of literature is a far deeper and far more meaningful activity than trading opinions about which Eric Carle book has the cutest illustrations. Allen (1997) explains that analysis helps readers “become aware of the more sophisticated attributes of books, such as authors' writing styles” (p. 56) or an illustrator's artistic choices. An effective way to promote sophisticated analysis is through small-group literature discussions (Allen; Peterson & Eeds, 1990; Pierce & Gilles, 1993; Rosenblatt, 1983). Lauritzen and Jaeger (1997) explain “since stories can be approached from a variety of intellectual and developmental levels, everyone has the opportunity to find a measure of delight...to stretch their minds, and to inquire and explore the possibilities” (p. 42). Allen found that small-group discussions helped readers to “fully share, examine, and clarify their responses to literature” (p. 55), “invited personal responses, and encouraged sophisticated literary meaning making” (p. 67). When readers share what they have gleaned from a text they help others see dimensions of characters and plots they might not have noticed alone. They begin to understand the value of certain themes, styles, and illustrations, and come to respect others' perspectives (Eeds & Wells, 1989).
Pedagogy. Knowing which books to choose is crucial for preservice teachers, but so is knowing how to use them most effectively with students, particularly in schools moving to more literature-based and interdisciplinary curricula. Sound pedagogy tells us that children's literature cannot be used as a simple, trendy device for organizing instruction, offered as the revolutionary replacement for textbooks or curriculum guides. We have to ask ourselves whether having preservice teachers dress up like Mrs. Frizzle so they can rattle off oral reports on a series of Magic School Bus books to their peers really prepares them for the serious instructional task of selecting books and planning literature-based lessons for their students. We have to ask ourselves whether activities unrelated to school curriculum standards reinforce the notion that children's literature is not a serious and powerful educational tool.
Unfortunately, teacher educators must battle these and other powerful influences on preservice teachers' pedagogical beliefs. Lortie (1975) states that often much of what preservice teachers believe to be most educationally effective is learned in the 13 or so years of schooling they have prior to their teacher training. For most preservice teachers, this did not include participation in literature-based or interdisciplinary teaching and learning. In fact, today's preservice teachers probably experienced mostly textbook-driven and compartmentalized curricula. A decade ago, Tyson and Woodward (1989) found that “textbooks structure from 75-90 percent of classroom instruction. In most subject areas, textbooks define the scope and sequence of instruction, and the accompanying teacher guides provide a road map from which few teachers make major detours” (p. 14). And perhaps most distressing, the present-day teacher resource market is being flooded by thousands of attractively packaged workbooks masquerading as literature-based teaching tools. Many are either skill and drill with literature instead of basals, or encourage only nonacademic postreading activities like cooking pasta or making quilts.
But rather than develop a long list of “best practices” for using literature as an effective educational tool or for integrating instruction (there are many), I'd like to suggest that good teaching comes after development of a theoretical basis for instructional decisions (Kagan, 1992; Lortie, 1975). Posner (1996) states that in order to develop a theory base, preservice teachers must have the opportunity to reflect on actual experiences, otherwise they will “rely on routine behavior...guided more by impulse, tradition, and authority than by reflection” (p. 21). The role of the children's literature instructor, then, is to provide first-hand opportunities to select, read, and analyze children's literature and relevant resources, as I have already suggested. Lectures and textbook readings can provide preservice teachers with an important foundation of information about children's literature. However, actual experiences with children's literature and suitable field experiences using literature in education settings are likewise critical for developing a pedagogical theory base for instructional decision making.
Field experiences. The difficulty in presenting preservice teachers with opportunities to read, analyze, and select children's books and examine the relevant resources to learn pedagogical principles that may be new or unfamiliar to them is that their beliefs may be difficult to change unless they are able actually to experience the success of the methods with children (Campoy, 1998; Hoewisch, 1998a; Kagan, 1992; Lortie, 1975; Richardson, 1986; Richardson-Koehler, 1988). Since convincing teachers what works and what doesn't is a matter of experience and experimentation, preservice teachers must have the chance to test and reflect on the instructional methods that they hear and read about in courses (Campoy; Hoewisch, 1998b; Posner, 1996; Schon, 1983). And if we really believe children's literature is as valuable to children as the research says it is, preservice teachers must have this chance long before student teaching. Children's literature courses must be designed to provide preservice teachers with field experiences in classrooms with children using children's literature and complimentary instructional methods even as they are learning about children's literature.
While most would agree that field experiences are a critical component of teacher training, there are those -- including instructors and students -- who believe they are not a convenient component. Preservice teachers have jobs, families, and other commitments outside of their teacher-preparation responsibilities that can complicate scheduling of appropriate field experiences. Finding, scheduling, placing, and then supervising field experiences for preservice teachers can also become a logistical nightmare for the individual instructor -- especially if more than one school or educational setting is needed to support a large number of preservice teachers.
However, for every reasonable problem associated with attaching field experiences to children's literature or any teacher-education course, there is at least one solution. For example, students who take evening-only programs, field experiences can be arranged with after-school clubs, scouting organizations, library programs, preschools that operate before and after the traditional work day, and child-care centers attended by school-age children before and after the school day. Instructors can build relationships with schools that have a commitment to improving literacy and are willing to partner with the university so that schedules, goals, and even staff development are created to include preservice teachers and children's literature course components. In this way, cooperating classroom teachers and building administrators, and even parents of students in the school, can participate in the supervision of the preservice teachers' field experiences along with the course instructor. Certainly, a host of other solutions and innovations can satisfy logistical concerns or objections to field experiences for preservice teachers. The real issue here is the undeniable benefit of having preservice teachers participate in authentic experiences with children and books. The challenge is to establish the best sort of field experiences for preservice teachers in order that they become more reflective about the books they share and the instructional methods they implement with children.
I would suggest that providing preservice teachers with opportunities simply to read aloud to children is one of the best sorts of field experience in a children's literature course. Preservice teachers should have the opportunity to determine through personal experience how best to hold a book so 28 kindergartners can see the illustrations. They should experiment with seating arrangements to consider whether fifth graders can listen while lounging on bean-bag chairs. And they should be responsible for selecting literature they believe is appropriate, so that when their students yawn in apathy they will seriously consider why.
Preservice teachers should also go into the field to talk to kids, teachers, parents, and librarians about children's literature. They can determine for themselves that not all public or even school libraries and librarians are created equal. They can discover how much or how little children actually care about certain authors, illustrators, and stories. They can investigate the extent to which classroom teachers and parents find literature helpful in supporting children's learning and perhaps share their own insights about its value.
And preservice teachers should implement literature-based lessons related to reading in content areas. In this way they can discover that not all books that refer to or illustrate numbers are useful for teaching math. Or they can determine that some of the best books to support science learning are actually fictional accounts of flying frogs, such as Tuesday, in which concepts like gravity and physics can be explored. And they can consider how best to capitalize on children's strong emotional responses to Faithful Elephants, The Endless Steppe, and Sadako and the Thousand Paper Cranes in order to assist them in examining the underlying historical causes and effects of and perspectives on World War II.
In addition, preservice teachers' experiences must be supported by opportunities to reflect on their level of success with certain books and seating arrangements, with children and lessons. Since “we do not actually learn from experience as much as we learn from reflecting on experience” (Posner, 1996, p. 21), preservice teachers must be encouraged to consider the significance of their instructional decisions. The unreflective teacher might give up on The True Story of the Three Little Pigs after it flops with children because he has not considered that they cannot possibly appreciate the book's rich irony without having heard the original Three Little Pigs. On the other hand, the preservice teacher who reflects on her suburban students' languid response to Charlotte's Web after the opening chapters might consider developing a concept map related to farming and rural life in order to activate schemata while building her students' vocabulary and interest in the topic.
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Reading Online, www.readingonline.org
Posted February 2000
© 2000 International Reading Association, Inc. ISSN 1096-1232