High School Block:

Children’s Literature 120

Children’s Literature 120 offers learners the opportunity to explore the evolution of children’s literature, gain an understanding the profound impact of representation, and analyze the various genres, to gain insight into the essential question: why is children’s literature important?

Learners will engage in critical discussions on the ethical considerations surrounding children’s literature, exploring how stories can promote empathy, understanding, and a sense of identity. The course components on representation will allow learners to understand that every child deserves to see themselves reflected in the stories they read. The final aspect of the course, focused on creation and communication, empowers learners to demonstrate their understanding in ways that align with their interests and abilities, encouraging creative and critical responses to the rich world of children’s literature. 

For Educators:

➔ PL Hub: English Language Arts

CONTEXTS AND CONCEPTS

History and Significance

  • Beginnings
  • Evolution
  • Views of Children/Childhood
  • Society and Politics
  • Pop-Culture
  • Media
Diversity and Representation

  • Voice
  • Stereotypes
  • Bias
  • Ways of Knowing and Being
  • Worldview
  • Windows and Mirrors
  • Censorship
Interrogating Text

  • Genre Study
  • Criticality
  • Mentor Texts
  • Annotation
  • Textual Analysis
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GRADE 12

Strand: History and Significance

Big Idea: Importance

Skill Descriptor: Reflect on personal experiences with children’s literature.

Global Competencies: CM, SASM

Achievement Indicators:

  • Discuss personal connections with characters from children’s literature
  • Explain personal preferences for certain texts (genre and content)
  • Articulate the importance of children’s literature in fostering identity and worldview

Skill Descriptor: Articulate an understanding of the impact of children’s literature.

Global Competencies: SASM, CTPS

Achievement Indicators:

  • Explore emotions evoked through the reading of children’s literature
  • Understand how personal experiences with children’s literature inform current worldview

Skill Descriptor: Examine children’s literature as a means of children seeing themselves, understanding others, and exploring the world.

Global Competencies: CM, CTPS

Achievement Indicators:

  • Articulate understanding of the importance of all children being able to see themselves reflected in literature
  • Identify texts considering relatability and representation

Skill Descriptor: Investigate the genres of children’s literature.

Global Competencies: CM, CTPS

Achievement Indicators:

  • Identify and explain features of various genres
  • Delineate the connection between genre and purpose and audience

Big Idea: Evolution

Skill Descriptor: Explore the beginnings of children’s literature.

Global Competencies: SGC, CM, CTPS

Achievement Indicators:

  • Determine the reasons why Western cultures did not view children as a worthy audience
  • Examine children’s literature as a means of moral instruction and education

Skill Descriptor: Research the evolution of children’s literature leading up to today.

Global Competencies: SGC, CTPS

Achievement Indicators:

  • Scrutinize how children’s literature is impacted by social and political factors
  • Investigate the prominence of children’s literature within the current literary market
  • Discern the impact of pop-culture and marketing on children’s literature (e.g., Disney)

Strand: Textual Analysis

Big Idea: Genre

Skill Descriptor: Investigate the visual features within various genres of children’s literature.

Global Competencies: CTPS

Achievement Indicators:

  • Identify and reflect on the meaning and impact of the visual features used in texts
  • Identify artistic techniques that contribute to visual literacy (e.g., colour, line, shape, texture, light/dark, layout, artistic style)

Skill Descriptor: Determine the meaning and impact of the unique elements that define various genres.

Global Competencies: CTPS

Achievement Indicators:

  • Identify the elements of various genres (e.g., character, plot, theme, setting, mood)
  • Interpret genre specific text features used by authors to convey meaning
  • Compare and contrast the elements of different genres

Strand: Critical Analysis

Big Idea: Diversity and Representation

Skill Descriptor: Explore how characters and/or other story/visual elements challenge and/or reinforce stereotypical ways of being.

Global Competencies: SGC, CTPS, CM

Achievement Indicators:

  • Identify when characters and/or other story/visual elements challenge and/or reinforce stereotypes
  • Examine portrayals of Indigenous and non-Western characters in children’s literature
  • Articulate the impact that the conformity or non-conformity to stereotypes has on the reader

Skill Descriptor: Understand the importance of diverse representations in children’s literature.

Global Competencies: SGC, CTPS, SASM

Achievement Indicators:

  • Determine who is represented in a text and who is not
  • Consider how the inclusion of different perspectives might confirm, challenge, or extend the message of a text
  • Reflect on the impact that diverse representation has in understanding ourselves and our world

Strand: Creation and Communication

Big Idea: Process

Skill Descriptor: Select text form, considering purpose and audience.

Global Competencies: CM, ICE

Achievement Indicators:

  • Develop and articulate rationale for which writing/representing processes work best in relation to audience and purpose

Skill Descriptor: Develop and format a text form.

Global Competencies: CM, CTPS, ICE

Achievement Indicators:

  • Identify the features of chosen mentor texts (e.g., annotation, discussion, conference, must-might chart, etc.)
  • Articulate how mentor texts informed the development of the product

Skill Descriptor: Draft, revise, edit, and publish a cohesive text.

Global Competencies: ICE, CM, CL, CTPS

Achievement Indicators:

  • Interpret, select, and combine information using a variety of strategies, resources, and technologies
  • Independently and/or collaboratively draft cohesive text/visuals, making critical choices about what to include or exclude
  • Clarify, strengthen and refine by adding, deleting, substituting, and rearranging elements of the text
  • Attend to audience experience, often by reading aloud/rehearsing, and adjusting elements of composition
  • Apply knowledge of copyright/plagiarism (including the use of A.I.)

Big Idea: Craft

Skill Descriptor: Convey ideas/content that engages the audience.

Global Competencies: ICE, CTPS

Achievement Indicators:

  • Develop a specific topic that captures the purpose and audience
  • Sustain focus throughout
  • Design original, thoughtful, and compelling ideas to support meaning
  • Incorporate vivid and varied vocabulary
  • Make effective use of words and phrases in accordance with the form and purpose (e.g., literary devices)
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