Children growing up in the United States live in a society filled with many different cultural backgrounds, so it is essential children be educated about these differences within the cultures. Children can be educated about this issue through their literature. Children’s literature can serve as the vehicle to educate our children on a multicultural society for developing awareness of social inequalities and the different forces that may impact their lives as a member of one of these different ethnic groups (Woods 176). “Such literature will promote discussion and often help readers to accept and deal with their own experiences and feelings about these issues,” (Woods 174). In this paper, we will discuss what is children’s literature, why it is important children learn the issues of a multicultural society at an early age, how to pick a good literature book for a child and the pitfalls made picking children’s book, and finally we will discuss how Jerry Spinelli’s Maniac Magee and Andrew Clements’s The Jacket fit into the genre of a multicultural book.
“There’s a real appetite for reading these days and I try to get across to children the passion for reading which is food for the mind and the heart, like a medicine or a vitamin,” (Kuntz 41). The increasingly important role of children’s literature in the lives of young children may be seen in the numbers of children’s books published per year. The 1940’s only 984 books were published in the United States for children, but in 1997, there were 5,353 such books published just for children (Mendoza and Reese 2). Children’s literature used to refer simply to stories we told our children. Now, children’s books are still stories we tell our children, but now these stories serve an important multi-purpose role. Children’s books not only entertain but also they inform, explore and help them understand the world, explore their feelings, and help shape their values. “Literature can be used as one of the tools to build images and concepts in the minds of children,” (Tolson 1). Children’s literature can help us teach our children a lot of things to be aware of, but this paper will concentrate on the importance of a child’s awareness of a multicultural society.
In and out of school, children are exposed to racist and sexist attitudes and these attitudes are expressed over and over in the media and in books until stereotypes are formed (10 Quick Ways to Analyze Children’s Books for Racism and Sexism 1). “In today’s ethnically diverse classrooms, it’s essential that books reflect students’ cultural backgrounds,” (Shioshita 1). Children’s books of today can deal with the harshness of racism or the prejudices of being different without robbing them of hope for the future. Children’s literature should provide real characters and events that children can relate to so they can see themselves in the characters same situations doing their same actions. These situations in book introduce children to what the world may be like through others’ eyes and offer them a chance to build their own opinions of themselves and the world around them. Such books also promote discussion and often help young children accept or deal with their own experiences and feeling about these kinds of issues (Woods 174). We have to recognize that from the United States inception, it was a racist and sexist society and myths and stereotypes were created to justify these racist and sexist practices (Banfield 21).
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