In this unit, we will be reading a range of picture books, some light-hearted and funny, and others serious and tragic. We will be looking closely at prologues/forewords, social issues raised, author’s purpose, and writing craft; the final project is writing meaningful stories for children, stories with important social messages.
The social issues we will be reading and writing about fall into certain categories:
- Social Pressure – How do others tell us how to be? What are the consequences? Ex. Bullying, gangs, war, etc.
- Social Consciousness – What good actions should we be involved with and why? Ex. Increase funds for public schools, volunteer to clean up parks, etc.
- Tolerance vs. Intolerance – Who is and isn’t accepted and why? Ex. Racism, homophobia, etc.
Author’s Purpose – the books we will be reading have different purposes; they do one or more of the following:
- Call to action – urge people to act in a particular way to solve a problem
- Envision possibility – show that there is hope in the future in solving a problem
- Bear witness – focus on the difficulties experienced as a result of a particular problem
Styles – there are different ways to communicate messages around issues:
- Realistic fiction – a fictional story; can also include elements of non-fiction; may be creative non-fiction
- Allegory – a form of extended metaphor, in which objects, persons, and actions in a narrative, are equated with the meanings that lie outside the narrative itself. The underlying meaning has moral, social, religious, or political significance, and characters are often personifications of abstract ideas as charity, greed, or envy. Thus, an allegory is a story with two meanings, a literal meaning and a symbolic meaning.
- Poetry - some picture books consist of an illustrated poem that is often narrative
- Nonfiction - a children's book can be a memoir, autobiography, biography, or other informational text.
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