tag:theconversation.com,2011:/uk/topics/childrens-writing-13228/articlesChildren's writing – The Conversation2018-04-19T00:50:25Ztag:theconversation.com,2011:article/948032018-04-19T00:50:25Z2018-04-19T00:50:25ZWhy treehouses are all the rage in children’s books<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/215142/original/file-20180417-101517-12tcqk2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">There is a rich tradition of trees in mythology.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Shutterstock</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>Two of Australia’s most popular children’s storytellers live in a treehouse. It’s a <a href="http://www.andygriffiths.com.au/books/">Thirteen-Storey</a> one, at least it started out that way. The storytellers are Terry Denton and Andy Griffiths, responsible for an array of children’s comedies, who live in a fantasy treehouse paradise. There they write and illustrate their stories, distracted by the lemonade fountains, see-through shark-infested swimming pool and a marshmallow gun that shoots directly into your mouth.</p>
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<p>Since its arrival on the literary scene in 2011, this Treehouse has grown by 13 storeys at a time. The next edition will be 104 storeys. The books have sold <a href="https://www.booksandpublishing.com.au/articles/2017/07/13/93122/introducing-the-treehouse-series/">over 3 million copies</a> in Australia alone. The treehouse now contains a detective agency, a mashed potato and gravy train and a machine that makes money… or honey… depending on what you’d prefer. These delights interrupt Andy and Terry as they write for their publisher, Mr Bignose. Indeed the treehouse functions as a metaphor for the writing process … its storeys provide food for the stories produced inside.</p>
<p>Treehouses feature often in children’s stories. In Dav Pilkey’s popular <a href="http://www.pilkey.com/series/captain-underpants">Captain Underpants</a> series, the heroes George and Harold write comics in their treehouse and retreat to it when things get out of hand, to regroup and create their way out of trouble. There are, of course, Tolkien’s Ents, the walking trees who fight on the side of good against Sauron and his army. Or Dr Seuss’s Lorax, who guards the Truffula trees from devastation. Ents and the Lorax are guardians of the ecosystem. When they act we know that something is badly out of kilter - in these cases in the fight between good and evil. </p>
<p>Mention Enid Blyton’s Faraway Tree stories, meanwhile, and many a grown-up gets misty-eyed. Mary Pope Osborne’s Magic Tree House series has been going strong for 25 years, and has nearly 100 titles. Carter Higgins’s <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/26090147-everything-you-need-for-a-treehouse">Everything You Need for a Treehouse</a> helps you get kitted out for your own woodland home. And mythology is full of trees.</p>
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<span class="caption">The World Tree in a 17th century Icelandic manuscript.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Wikimedia Commons</span></span>
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<p>The World Tree of ancient Norse mythology, <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yggdrasil">Yggdrasil</a>, is similar to the thirteen-storey treehouse, linking the nine realms of the world (of fire, of ice, of elves, of gods, of fertility, of giants, of dwarves, of humans, and of the dishonorable dead). In Ovid’s Metamorphoses, when King Eresichthyon of Thessaly cut down the Greek Goddess Demeter’s favourite oak tree she teamed up with her sister Fames to torment him with a hunger so eternal that he eventually ate himself. </p>
<p>The Russian witch, Baba Yaga, lives in a mobile treehouse on a chicken foot, like an old-fashioned Grey Nomad. The Biblical serpent tempted Eve to taste fruit of the tree of knowledge. And many European forests are inhabited by tree creatures, such as sylphs and dryads, <a href="https://antipodeanodyssey.wordpress.com/2018/02/15/the-eco-friendly-dryads-of-slavic-fantasy-literature/">eco-friendly creatures that appear in fantasy literature such as Polish writer Andrzej Sapkowski’s The Witcher</a>. </p>
<p>So it’s not surprising that living in the trees gives Andy and Terry and George and Harold access to fantasy spaces, and to magic and mystery. A technical term for this is liminality: in a liminal space, you are on the borders of things, or thresholds (the word come from the Latin for threshold, limen). If you live in a tree, you are up in the air, but connected to the earth. </p>
<p>At heart, most myths respond to fundamental practical needs. Tree house stories recognise that children need time in nature. For generations of urban children, these books offer a fantasy of unsupervised creative spaces where they can control their own adventures, face dangers that test them and engage with others in a less restricted way.</p>
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<span class="caption">Baba Yaga by Alexandre Benois.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Wikimedia Commons</span></span>
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<p>In <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/25810638-vitamin-n">Vitamin N: The Essential Guide to a Nature Rich Life</a> (2016), author Richard Louv coined the phrase “Nature deficit disorder” to describe the human costs of alienation from the natural world. Opportunities for play in nature have dramatically declined in urbanised societies and with them, benefits such as creativity, problem-solving and emotional and intellectual development.</p>
<p>Writers like Denton and Griffiths recognise the child’s need for nature. So does <a href="https://ttinamatthews.com/books/waiting-for-later/">Tina Matthews, in whose Waiting for Later</a> a tree provides company for a child whose family is too busy to spend time with her. And so does mythology which regularly takes characters into nature, to confront, to challenge or to come to terms with life. </p>
<p>While the Thirteen-Storey Treehouse may not be directly inspired by Yggdrasil or Demeter’s Oak, or hop about like Baba Yaga’s hut, it understands the relation between creativity and time in the woods, taking part in a grand literary tradition that goes as far back as myth itself.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/94803/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Elizabeth Hale receives funding from the European Research Council (Our Mythical Childhood . . . grant 681202, researching the reception of classical antiquity in contemporary children's culture)</span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>Lynnette Lounsbury does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>From the Thirteen-Storey Treehouse to the Magic Faraway Tree, kids loves treehouses. These books tap into a rich tradition of mythology, which takes characters into forests to come to terms with life.Elizabeth Hale, Senior Lecturer in English and Writing (children's literature), University of New EnglandLynnette Lounsbury, Lecturer in Communications and History, Avondale College of Higher EducationLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/543032016-02-18T10:47:34Z2016-02-18T10:47:34ZWhen do children learn to write? Earlier than you might think<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/111699/original/image-20160216-19232-oxw3pb.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Young children are writing even before they are reading.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/radioflyer007/1471652986/in/photolist-3f3Bam-s6Zvyc-8FtWXT-gnthDM-gnt16q-N7Zdr-8REmPR-8Fx75W-8FtVNR-8FtXST-73j5zZ-7UQuxP-7UQuw2-dsLkS6-dsLvqm-dr7ZBT-dsLvsG-mFcTct-mFcVyH-e6VpZi-e723Yf-2pMGZ-mFd5ji-mFd4QH-mFeWWh-mFdoe4-mFdncp-mFd6mZ-8NzkqD-8NCqQm-8NCqwY-drEKDL-drEAQ2-drEKBy-drEKCN-72pExw-73iUCK-8NCqNJ-8Nzk4k-8NzjTZ-8NCqs7-8NCqoU-8NCqgL-8NCqys-8NCqCh-8NzjVk-dRxssL-8N6Gmz-8N6GC6-8N9LH1">Steven Yeh</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/">CC BY-NC-ND</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>We typically think of writing as something that is out of reach for preschool children. After all, young children can’t write recognizable letters, and they can’t spell words. </p>
<p>We have been <a href="http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/cdev.12478/abstract;jsessionid=01153C9AAA774A22DE550D06C0404C13.f04t02?systemMessage=Wiley+Online+Library+will+be+unavailable+on+Saturday+27th+February+from+09%3A00-14%3A00+GMT+%2F+04%3A00-09%3A00+EST+%2F+17%3A00-22%3A00+SGT+for+essential+maintenance.++Apologies+for+the+inconvenience.&userIsAuthenticated=false&deniedAccessCustomisedMessage=">studying</a> young children’s knowledge about writing in our research. And we are finding that they know more about writing – even before they learn to read – than one might think. </p>
<h2>Writing is smaller than drawing</h2>
<p>Consider this production by a two-and-a-half-year-old American child, Sophia:</p>
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<span class="caption">Sophia’s drawing.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">WUSTL Photo / Courtesy of Rebecca Treiman</span>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/">CC BY</a></span>
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<p>Sophia identified the large circular portion on the right as a drawing of a circle. She said that the portion with small squiggles on the bottom and near the left was writing. Sophia’s writing did not use recognizable letters, nor was she spelling any specific word.</p>
<p>However, she seemed to know that writing is generally smaller than drawing and that writing is arranged along a line. </p>
<p><a href="http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1598/RRQ.43.1.5/abstract">Research has supported</a> what the example from Sophia suggests – that children as young as two or three years of age already know about some of the basic differences in appearance between writing and pictures. They try to reproduce these differences in their own attempts to write and draw. </p>
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<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/111690/original/image-20160216-19245-3qdzak.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/111690/original/image-20160216-19245-3qdzak.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=450&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/111690/original/image-20160216-19245-3qdzak.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=450&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/111690/original/image-20160216-19245-3qdzak.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=450&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/111690/original/image-20160216-19245-3qdzak.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=566&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/111690/original/image-20160216-19245-3qdzak.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=566&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/111690/original/image-20160216-19245-3qdzak.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=566&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Children know from early on that writing is arranged along a line.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">WUSTL Photo/Courtesy of Rebecca Treiman</span>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/">CC BY</a></span>
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<p><a href="http://doi.org/10.1016/j.jecp.2010.08.013">Consider a study</a> in which Chinese children were asked to write several words, such as “sun,” and also to draw pictures of those same things. Two- and three-year-old children’s attempts to write characters were far off the mark, bearing little resemblance to the correct characters. </p>
<p>However, children’s writings tended to be smaller than their drawings. The writings were also less curvy and more angular, angularity being a property of characters in Chinese. </p>
<p>Not only did children make different sorts of marks when writing than when drawing, they also chose different implements to do so. Specifically, children would often choose dark pens or pencils to write and colored crayons to draw.</p>
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<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/111691/original/image-20160216-24635-1s8cs8k.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/111691/original/image-20160216-24635-1s8cs8k.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=450&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/111691/original/image-20160216-24635-1s8cs8k.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=450&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/111691/original/image-20160216-24635-1s8cs8k.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=450&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/111691/original/image-20160216-24635-1s8cs8k.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=565&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/111691/original/image-20160216-24635-1s8cs8k.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=565&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/111691/original/image-20160216-24635-1s8cs8k.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=565&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Children know the difference between writing and drawing.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">WUSTL Photo/Courtesy of Rebecca Treiman</span>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/">CC BY</a></span>
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<p>In another part of this study, adults were shown the productions that the children had made. They were told that some of them were produced in response to a request to write and that others were produced in response to a request to draw. The adults were not told which was which, and their job was to guess. </p>
<p>The adults found the task to be difficult, which is not surprising. However, they performed better than would be expected by random guessing even with the productions of two- and three-year-old children.</p>
<p>Clearly, children were doing something different when writing than when drawing – different enough that adults could even detect some of the differences. </p>
<h2>Drawings can have different labels, words remain same</h2>
<p>Young children may know that writing generally looks different from writing, but the next question is: do they have any understanding that it functions differently? </p>
<p>One important property of writing is that it represents a specific word in a specific language. The written word “rabbit,” for example, stands for the spoken word “rabbit.” It would not be appropriate to read this word as “bunny.”</p>
<p>In contrast, we can look at a picture of a rabbit and say that it is a rabbit or a bunny or an animal – any one of these labels, or others, would be considered correct. </p>
<p><a href="http://doi.org/10.1111/cdev.12478">In a recent study</a>, we examined children’s knowledge of this important difference between writing and drawing. The children in the study ranged from three to five years old, and they were not able to read words themselves. A researcher would show a child a written word such as the word rabbit and would read it to the child. </p>
<p>Later, when a puppet employed in the experiment read the word as “bunny,” many children picked up the mistake. In a similar task with drawings, children were more likely to say that the puppet was correct in using the alternative label.</p>
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<span class="caption">Children know that writing and drawing function in different ways.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/donnieray/25011363125/in/photolist-E7aLSH-4Vu2kb-83Dx4q-i6yCh-dNjh4k-dNpRpf-dNpRwm-dNpRuS-dNjgTF-dNpRvh-dNpRCw-dNpRDN-dNjh1V-dNpRyC-pxrWN-LAMe1-4B6VnH-4ERSZL-27u8D-7HMQMS-27u4h-ehncU4-96n6Yn-fTaEiQ-6fMM6i-n9L9W-ikVsYr-8tE9z7-fy2ypE-2BzZNk-cJjCZ7-7LQBv7-94EcJg-8tB8ak-guJ9jQ-CQsC7Y-8mLSuL-befrR-8tB7Tg-fnywF-4kDvPm-9D9Xdv-3eYru-4kDvhh-5xp7ZC-3eYre-2wKYbU-t15jkU-5xjFzP-7xFbUV">Donnie Ray Jones</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/">CC BY</a></span>
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<p>The different results in the writing and drawing tasks suggest that young children have some understanding that a written word stands for one specific unit of language in a way that a drawing does not. </p>
<p>They are beginning to understand that, while a written word should be read the same way each time, it is sometimes appropriate to use different labels for a drawing. Importantly, children begin to acquire this understanding even before they can sound out words themselves.</p>
<h2>Encouraging children to write</h2>
<p>Parents and teachers sometimes dismiss children’s early productions as scribbles – signs of a lack of knowledge about how to write and how to draw. </p>
<p>Reading activities are common in preschools, and parents appreciate the importance of reading to their young children. The value of writing is less widely appreciated. Reading activities are more common than writing activities in preschools. And parents too tend to give more importance to reading. Preschool writing activities may be limited to having children write their names. </p>
<p>The research we have reviewed, <a href="http://doi.org/10.1598/rrq.43.1.5">together with other findings</a>, shows that children begin to learn about some of the visible distinctions between writing and drawing from an early age. Our research shows that from a surprisingly young age, children have some knowledge about what writing looks like and how it functions. That is, young children know more about writing than we might think. There is more to their scribbles than meets the eye. </p>
<p>Preschool teachers and parents can build on the knowledge that children have. If we know what to look for, we can acknowledge what children already know, for example by saying, “You did a good job of writing on a line here.” This can help children advance to the next step. </p>
<p> </p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/54303/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>The authors do not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and have disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Don’t dismiss children’s early writing as scribbles. Children know more about writing, even before they learn to read.Rebecca Treiman, Burke and Elizabeth High Baker Professor of Child Developmental Psychology, Washington University in St. LouisLori Markson, Associate Professor of Psychology, Washington University in St. LouisLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/331252014-11-19T09:21:45Z2014-11-19T09:21:45ZHow this year’s National Book Awards could change the face of children’s literature<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/64887/original/dmdkvqbr-1416330287.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Literary awards can have a profound impact on sales -- and, in the future, which books get published and promoted.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/ozyman/443545349/in/photolist-63N8zu-5eQ5Po-ppBuze-pRAB3b-4mFRFU-nchT6v-f89m91-54VLAP-8F572b-T9dB6-dtwoYm-9qASCC-5QcAf-FchzB-a4Rjre-w9ZMr-ejq6oM-dtqQUX-npXn8L-9wBrUn-f7SiaK-ckh33w-621H5V-PwTRr-f7Puvt-aA6KBa-48SsXs-jxTEho-4WJy89-hFkBu-dNpT1L-91cMiZ-52agvg-9CSZnm-aW3zhK-FscMf-6GAXX6-jNrr1X-98a2K6-4Gb22e-i6H2c4-f85aJb-aSADB4-9fU3uv-f7Qc4B-6yQzPv-6GxJhz-apaLbS-6GxJhr-6oSfiE/">QQ Li/Flickr</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/4.0/">CC BY-NC-SA</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>There’s a lot of attention right now on diversity in children’s books – or, more accurately, the lack of it. It’s not a new problem. White people have been talking about this issue since Nancy Larrick published “The All-White World of Children’s Books” in Saturday Review back in 1965. People of color have been aware of it for much longer.</p>
<p>So what has happened over those past fifty years? There was a flurry of activity in the mid-1960s when children’s book publishers actively sought out new authors and illustrators of color. Authors and artists who went on to become the greats of the field – Virginia Hamilton, Mildred D. Taylor, Walter Dean Myers, Leo & Diane Dillon, and Tom Feelings – published their first books. And librarians and teachers (who represented the lion’s share of the market for children’s books) purchased their books to share with children. Educators began to evaluate books with a heightened social consciousness. </p>
<p>In the mid-1970s, for the first time, African-American authors and illustrators won Newbery and Caldecott Medals. These are the most prestigious awards in children’s literature and the only ones that have a lasting impact on book sales, because the Newbery and Caldecott books stay in print for decades. For this reason, publishers seek to publish books that have a chance to win these awards, and it’s common practice to publish books that mimic – in some form – the most recent winners. </p>
<p>So when books about African-American characters started to win the Newbery and Caldecott Medal, publishers began to release more books with African-American characters.</p>
<p>But by 1985 the number of books by authors of color leveled off. Those who had established their careers ten or fifteen years earlier were still being published, but there weren’t many new authors and illustrators of color being published. The optimistic atmosphere that had been created because of real change in the industry began to fade. A few years later author Walter Dean Myers looked back on this bygone era in a hard-hitting op-ed piece in the New York Times called “<a href="http://www.nytimes.com/1986/11/09/books/children-s-books-i-actually-thought-we-would-revolutionize-the-industry.html">I Actually Thought We Would Revolutionze the Industry</a>.”</p>
<p>Fast forward to 2014, when another op-ed piece by Walter Dean Myers appeared in the New York Times. “<a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2014/03/16/opinion/sunday/where-are-the-people-of-color-in-childrens-books.html?_r=0">Where Are the People of Color in Children’s Books?</a>” he asked. He quoted <a href="http://ccbc.education.wisc.edu/books/pcstats.asp">statistics from the Cooperative Children’s Book Center</a>, the library where I work, that showed little had changed in the twenty-five years since Myers first wrote about the issue.</p>
<figure class="align-right zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/64883/original/ny63pw7y-1416328418.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/64883/original/ny63pw7y-1416328418.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/64883/original/ny63pw7y-1416328418.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=896&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/64883/original/ny63pw7y-1416328418.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=896&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/64883/original/ny63pw7y-1416328418.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=896&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/64883/original/ny63pw7y-1416328418.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=1125&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/64883/original/ny63pw7y-1416328418.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=1125&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/64883/original/ny63pw7y-1416328418.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=1125&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
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<span class="caption">Published in 1974, Virginia Hamilton’s M.C. Higgins, the Great was one of a flurry of award-winning children’s books to feature people of color. By the 1980s, however, the trend reversed.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/51YSKN0X18L.jpg">Amazon.com</a></span>
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<p>The face of America is changing fast. <a href="http://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2014/08/18/u-s-public-schools-expected-to-be-majority-minority-starting-this-fall/">According to Pew</a>, the 2014-2015 school year is projected to be the first that will have more children of color in our public schools than white children. </p>
<p>So why haven’t children’s books changed? </p>
<p>It comes down to economics. Children’s book publishing is a business. The people who work in the industry are, for the most part, caring people, but they don’t always have a lot of leeway when it comes to the bottom line. They have to sell books. So who’s buying children’s books these days?</p>
<p>Fifty years ago, children’s librarians in both school and public libraries were the main consumers. They accounted for a large share of the market. But as school and library budgets have been slashed, they’ve had less and less buying power. They know there is demand for more diverse literature, but without the budgets, they can’t make as big an impact on book sales. </p>
<p>At the same time school and library budgets were being cut, the mega-bookstores, such as Barnes & Noble and Borders, entered the picture. They were less likely to stock books by and about people of color (unless, of course, they happened to have won the Newbery or Caldecott Medal). Take a look around the children’s section at Barnes & Noble and you’ll still see a mostly all-white world. </p>
<p>You can’t buy what you can’t find on the shelf. </p>
<p>Last spring at BookExpoAmerica’s BookCon – the trade show of US publishers – a panel of the top children’s authors consisted entirely of white men. This led to a grass-roots movement that has been steadily growing called <a href="http://weneeddiversebooks.tumblr.com/keyposts">We Need Diverse Books</a>. It was launched on a single day in April when people from around the country were invited to submit photographs of themselves and their children holding a sign that read “We Need Diverse Books.” The #WeNeedDiverseBooks Twitter campaign inspired a visual rainbow of readers, and sent a message to the children’s book publishers. </p>
<p>It said: <em>This is what your readers look like. We’re diverse. And we need diverse books.</em> </p>
<p>Are they having an impact? They are certainly raising awareness among the general public and within the publishing industry. When the <a href="http://www.nationalbook.org/nba2014.html#ypl">finalists</a> for the National Book Awards were announced, four of the five book included main characters of color, and the fifth had a secondary gay character.</p>
<p>Would the same five books have been selected a year ago? It’s possible. After all, they are all excellent books in their own right. But in an era when 80% of the new children’s books published each year are exclusively about white characters, it’s significant that in 2014 we have four out of five award finalists about characters who are not. </p>
<p>Book awards do make a difference. They bring fortune and fame to the authors and profits to publishers. Ultimately it might be the few individuals serving on an award committee who have the most power of all. </p>
<p>Want more diverse books? Recognize them with more awards.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/33125/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Kathleen T. Horning does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>There’s a lot of attention right now on diversity in children’s books – or, more accurately, the lack of it. It’s not a new problem. White people have been talking about this issue since Nancy Larrick…Kathleen T. Horning, Director of the Cooperative Children's Book Center, University of Wisconsin-MadisonLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/328572014-10-29T23:36:45Z2014-10-29T23:36:45ZCould you make your story more…interesting? Six ways to improve children’s writing<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/62690/original/8h79bc26-1414114296.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/62690/original/8h79bc26-1414114296.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/62690/original/8h79bc26-1414114296.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/62690/original/8h79bc26-1414114296.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/62690/original/8h79bc26-1414114296.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/62690/original/8h79bc26-1414114296.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/62690/original/8h79bc26-1414114296.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/62690/original/8h79bc26-1414114296.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
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<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Shutterstock</span></span>
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<p>We know a good piece of writing when we read it. But what makes the writing “good” and how can we teach <em>all</em> our kids the skills that seem to come naturally to a few. </p>
<p>Here are six principles teachers and parents can follow to improve their children’s writing.</p>
<h2>1. Good writing takes time</h2>
<p>Of all the many criticisms of national standardised testing regimes, the least discussed, and least educationally defensible, is the time limit we place on writing tasks. Unless you are a journalist, why would writing a story in under an hour be a criterion for successful writing? </p>
<p>Writing takes time. You need to think a lot. Who is in your story, what will happen and why? Where will it begin and how will it end?</p>
<p>Give students time. Don’t tap on the desk asking “Is that all you have written? Look at Emma - she has written two pages”. This simply tells kids that writing is about filling a quota - not carefully and artfully communicating ideas and knowledge.</p>
<p>If your kids haven’t written much, they are either thinking, or you have set them a task with no purpose or plan, or they have literacy struggles which won’t be solved by being told to get on with it.</p>
<h2>2. Learn to love grammar</h2>
<p>Grammar isn’t the thing you <em>correct</em> at the end of the writing process. Grammar is what you <em>teach</em> during the writing process. Our kids need teachers not copy editors.</p>
<p>Here are three levels of grammatical understanding that can help frame the way you think about grammar and its use in writing. </p>
<p><strong>Naming</strong></p>
<p>You can name parts of speech. But, in and of itself, this is “so what” knowledge. So what if your child can circle the adjective or underline the noun in the sentence. How will that make them a better writer?</p>
<p><strong>Function</strong></p>
<p>You can describe the grammatical function of parts of speech e.g. “Adjectives describe”. This is more useful knowledge because at least you know why you might want to use them in your writing. </p>
<p>However, just using lots of “describing words” doesn’t make good writing. If in doubt, read the story of any amazing, awesome, wicked, super clever, deadly laser beam shooting 10 year old. </p>
<p>It is not the size of your adjectives that counts - it’s what you do with them.</p>
<p><strong>Intention</strong></p>
<p>The third level of grammatical knowledge is the most useful - intention. This means choosing your words and organising your sentences with your story’s purpose and audience in mind. </p>
<p>Which is the right word to help tell your story, describe your character or evoke your setting? It might be “gargantuan,” but it could be “big”. It could be “verdant,” but it might be “green”. The right word isn’t always long, exotic or only found by searching a thesaurus - the right word is the one your story needs.</p>
<p>My observation of grammar teaching in schools - when it happens - is that it sits resolutely at the “so what” level of <strong>naming</strong>, occasionally reaches the “meh” level of <strong>function</strong> and very rarely hits the “wow, that makes a difference” level of <strong>intention</strong>.</p>
<h2>3. Teach language in context</h2>
<p>Take down your wall charts of interesting adjectives, unusual nouns and exciting verbs. These lists are misleading and pointless. </p>
<p>Words on a list are just words. The labels “adjective”, “verb”, “noun” describe the function of a word when it is in a sentence. For example, “deep” can be an adverb, adjective or noun depending upon its function in a sentence - deep in the bush, a deep dark well, or down in the deep. </p>
<p>Great authors choose their words with intention - and not because their editor wants them to use “interesting adjectives”.</p>
<h2>4. Write for a reason and make research a part of writing</h2>
<p>It’s hard to choose your words with intention when your writing has no purpose. Don’t tell kids to “write a story”. Have a reason for writing, and an audience who will read it.</p>
<p>It’s also hard to write about things you don’t know anything about. </p>
<p>Last year, my son did the national standardised NAPLAN test. The writing task was to write about a hero, and he wrote about me. I was flattered until he explained I wasn’t his first choice - he didn’t have enough information about other potential heroes stored inside his head to write a convincing persuasive piece. I was just someone he had quite a deal of biographical information about, so he wrote about me. </p>
<p>I was a little deflated but I saw his point.</p>
<h2>5. Ditch the drafts</h2>
<p>To write with purpose and intention you need a plan. </p>
<p>But kids won’t write drafts - as much as you you might like them to. Authors write drafts - because they are professionals with ambition and time on their hands. </p>
<p>Let kids plan in other ways - act out their story, draw their story, and tell their story to other people. Each time they “tell” their story in these ways they will refine it. When the listener is confused about where the dragon suddenly appeared from, they will think through the explanation. When they act out the plot, they will be inspired to refine it. When they draw their story they will be prompted to add more relevant detail.</p>
<h2>6. Read great books</h2>
<p>The very best way to write well is to look at good models of writing. Teach kids how language works by looking at it doing its work in its natural habitat - exemplary writing. </p>
<p>If you want your children to write well - read great books to them, and give them great books to read.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/32857/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
We know a good piece of writing when we read it. But what makes the writing “good” and how can we teach all our kids the skills that seem to come naturally to a few. Here are six principles teachers and…Misty Adoniou, Senior Lecturer in Language, Literacy and TESL, University of CanberraLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.