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Children's Literature
and Child Development
(*This
part is based on 1) Lynch-Brown, C. & Tomlinson, C. (2005).
Essentials of Children’s Literature (5th edition).
Chapter 1. Learning about children and their literature; and 2)
Russell, D. L. (2009). Literature for children: a short
introduction (6th edition). Chapter 2. The study of
childhood)
See
a chart of children's developmental stages
|
Ages 0-2
sensorimotor
period |
- nursery rhymes for reading
aloud
- brief, plotless, concept books
with brightly colored pictures
- interactive books (e.g.
touching and opening little doors)
- often in the form of heavy,
nontoxic cardboard or cloth books
|
|
Ages 2-4
pre-conceptual stage |
- simple-plot picture storybooks
and folktales for reading aloud
- nursery rhymes for them to
memorize
- concept books including
numbers, letters, and more complex concepts like
opposites (e.g. counting books, word books, and
illustrated dictionaries) |
|
Ages 4-7
Beginning
readers
intuitive
stage
|
- easy-to-read picture
storybooks, folktales, and rhymes for reading aloud,
storytelling, and “play-reading”
- informational books for
beginning readers that help children find out about
the world and how it works
- they begin to understand the
notion of stories, letter-sound relationship,
left-to-right and top-to-bottom progression of print
on the page, and a slight vocabulary |
|
Ages 7-9
Transitional readers
period of
concrete operations
(7-11
years) |
- longer picture books and short
chapter books with simple, straightforward plots and
writing styles
- their interest in folktales
begin to fall off by age 8; they show more interest
in realistic stories and adventures of young
characters |
|
Ages 9-12
Competent
readers
|
- sophisticated picture
storybooks and novels (chapter books) with more
complicated plots, including realistic fiction
(survival stories, peer stories, animal stories,
mysteries, and romances), historical fiction, and
science fiction
- series books containing similar
topics, recurring characters, and formulaic patterns
of plots |
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