reading and teaching with diverse nonfiction children’s books: representations and possibilities

This edited volume brings together ongoing professional conversations about diverse children’s books and the role and function of nonfiction and informational text in K-8 classrooms. The authors in this book respond to the urgent need to advance scholarship on children’s nonfiction literature that provides representations of populations traditionally marginalized in media and culture. Grounded in children’s literature research and criticism, the authors in this volume take as a given the reality that issues of representation matter, and that, with the existence of exemplary children’s nonfiction books, all educators, researchers, and scholars have a responsibility to move beyond texts with limited or problematic depictions and utilize quality books that accurately and authentically represent the world in which we live.