Courses

Study of various genres of children's literature, from various critical perspectives. Emphasis on role of literature in children's lives.

The study of childhood from cultural, historical, psychological, and philosophical perspectives.

An in-depth study of picturebooks as art objects providing aesthetic experiences and contributing to our aesthetic development in literacy education.

A study of nonfiction literature for children and adolescents with an emphasis on inspiring curiosity and agency.

Examine work by writers of classic fantasies (H. C. Andersen, A. A. Milne, etc.) written for children, as well as the work of some contemporary authors (J. K. Rowling, Philip Pullman, Tomi Adeyemi, Nnedi Okorafor, etc.) and popular comics. We will also look at the role of the imagination in the lives of children and the important ways children may transform their private spaces into spaces of wonder that allow them to flourish and reimagine their possibilities.

Critical study of adolescent literature, its diversity of cultural voices, and designs for its use in secondary school classrooms.

Read, discuss, analyze, and reflect on diverse literature from multicultural and critical multicultural perspectives to demonstrate how such ways of readings not only expand literacies but center issues of social justice.

An in-depth study of myths and folktales shared with children and how these stories are remade across different modes and disseminated today across multiple communities of practices.

Supervised workshop in the craft and techniques of writing picture books, short stories, longer fiction, and nonfiction literature for children.

Addresses the different research approaches for doing research in children's literature. Specifically, it discusses research methods and topics in a wide range of theoretical and practical fields — including psychoanalysis, literacies, genre studies, critical pedagogies, biographical studies, critical race theory, and reader responses — guiding learners on how to conduct original research around any topic of choice. It also addresses research methods for doing research on creative writing.