Welcome to Module 1:

Children and Adolescent’s Literature

WHAT IS THE MODULE ALL ABOUT?
This module is designed for you who are enrolled in the course “Children and Adolescent Literature”.
This is the first series of modules that will help and assist you become an expert pre-service educator.

YOU WILL STUDY THE FOLLOWING TOPICS IN THIS MODULE:

1. Personal and Academic Values of Literature to Children
2. Relationship between Children’s Development and their Literature
3. Historical Background of Children’s Literature

INTENDED LEARNING OUTCOMES:

After studying and working with this module, you must be able to
1. Expound on children and adolescent literature and its historical development in relation to today’s
rich repertoire; and
2. Recognize how language development can be achieved through the use of children and adolescent
literature.

Prepare yourself with the topics in Module 1, remember our study guide and follow our study schedule

Children’s literature has always had a place in the school curriculum. The literacy experiences of young
people have changed from time to time but the basic commitment to literature as a valuable ingredient to
education has remained.

The problem is the dearth of reading materials; the practical values of children’s books have not been freely
recognized. With this, children turn to anything that is accessible to them like comics, songbooks and magazines.
They watch mediocre TV shows and listen to the soapbox operas and other radio programs.

With the above predicament on the kind of environment the depraved child grows up with questionable values
in life. Unless there are people who are aware of the needs of the child those existing conditions are not possible
to change. These changes should be a cooperative undertaking combining the effort of those who touch the
child’s life- parents, teachers and librarian. They can work effectively to develop children a love of literature to
expand the horizon and enhance their worth as children who will someday become worthwhile adults. The
result is they will contribute to their country’s program and prosperity and who can be versatile in meeting the
challenge of a rapidly changing motion.

The world of books offers children rich opportunities for developing into good citizens and well-rounded
personalities who will be assets to their family and society.

1. Through books they may partly fulfill their basic emotional needs.
2. Books are no substitute for living, they can add immeasurably to its richness.
3. Literature in a child’s life provides a therapeutic value that must be recognized.
a. It provides emotional release
b. The child develops his taste in reading for pleasure.
c. It fulfills a need in the classroom which does not confine it to the language arts alone.
d. It can enrich their own language.
e. It offers many opportunities for creative teaching.
f. It provides various experiences which enhance to creative development of children.
4. Literature is entertainment.

Creative teaching of literature contributes to creative development of the child in many ways.

1. It can stimulate children to write for themselves.

2. It can help build a vocabulary that will help the child to express himself better.

Note: Write the answer of your activity and assessment/self-check in a yellow sheet paper. While the answer
of your assignment in your notebook.
 3. It can help children build shills in expression.
4. It can develop sensitivity to sights, sounds, words, life’s problems and people.

Good books are children’s best friends.

Assignment:

1. Explain: Books have therapeutic value for children. Cite instances how this is done.

Activity:
1. Identify concepts, values, and development of children and adolescent literature.

Assessment/Self-Check. Answer or suggest.

1. Name activities and devices which can be used to develop children’s interest in literature.
2. Soon you will become parents … If you are a parent of 2 to 4 years old, how do you start literature in your
child’s life?
3. Recall, when you were young around 2 to 4 years old how did your parents familiarize you in the field of
literature?

Did you do well? Go on to the next topic

if you did. If not, re-read this unit, giving
emphasis to the lessons you did not fully
Understand.

CHILDRENS’ READING INTEREST

Children’s reading materials were chosen in the light of their needs and interests and serve as an essential factor
in their development and growth. Good literature brings the child into contact with great minds and various
forms of experiences, increasing his knowledge of human nature and of the expanding world around him.
Literature does not only increase the child’s knowledge about life and living but can also become a springboard
for creative writing, dramatics, art and music.

It is necessary to know each child- his interests, capacities, needs, and aspirations. Parents, teachers and
librarian have to share the responsibility of helping a child find the right books and provide activities related to
his interest and needs.

Interest is an expression of an individual’s pattern of reaction or behavior toward himself, his environment, his
associates and the situations he may find himself. It may develop from early childhood and progresses onward
as result of experience. It can be interpreted as a motivating force that stimulates the individual to participate in
one activity rather than in another.

Needs “desire for what are called or considered necessities”. It is lack of these necessities. They are strong
motivations that have to be met.

They have been classified as physical, mental, emotional, social, moral, spiritual, aesthetic, economic, and
recreational. Other educators classify needs as: need for emotional security, need for material, intellectual,
spiritual, need to belong, to be a part of a group, need for recreation and diversion, need for aesthetic
satisfaction.

1. Need for Material Security

Note: Write the answer of your activity and assessment/self-check in a yellow sheet paper. While the answer
of your assignment in your notebook.
 The child’s need of material or economic security comes first and begins in his mother’s or father’s arms.
This includes his regular routine of eating and sleeping and everything that gives him comfort and well-
being.

2. Need for Emotional Security

Every child needs to be loved and wanted. It is a higher kind of security than material or economic
security. It has an inner and spiritual quality made up of love, courage and happiness- the fundamental
factors of security which every child should have and build into his ideals of family life. Example: Laura
Ingall’s “Little on the Prairie” and Louisa May Alcott’s “Little Women”.

3. Need for Intellectual Security

A child with keen intelligence has a wide intellectual curiosity about many things. Intelligence of a child
is augmented from reading materials, from household gadgets to radio, television and nowadays
through technology.

4. Need for Spiritual Security

Spiritual security enables the individual to surmount dangers, overcome failure and even tragedies. It is
a result of a strong religious belief. It grows out of a belief in God.

5. The Need to Belong

The need to be accepted in a group is very important. A child starts by saying “My Mommy” or “My
Daddy” or “My Big Brother” with great pride. These maybe signs that he is beginning to identify himself
with his family and then later on will identify with his gang, his school, his community, his town or city
and then his country and perhaps with other world groups.

6. The Need to Love and be Loved

Every human being wants to love and be loved. It is in his family that the child learns his first lesson in
the loves of affectionate relationships. His sense of security develops from these family patterns. When
family relationships are normal and happy, a child starts his life with health attitudes. If a child feels he is
loved and he knows his love is accepted, the result is he will learn to love other people outside his
family. If he feels unloved and unwanted, he is suspicious and antagonistic towards other people.

7. The Need to Achieve, to Do or be Someone Worthy of Respect

Children, as well as adults have a strong desire to achieve, to do something for which they respected
and loved. The child’s first heroes are his father who buys things for him and his mother who prepares
his food. Children enjoy the tales of adventures, mystery and career stories. Interest and devotion to a
worthy cause, untiring service to the needs of others leads children to read about the lives of people
who had worthy achievements.

8. Need for Recreation or Change

One right of a child is to rest or play as a part of the desire for change. If they work and study hard, they
need rest or play. They need freedom from pressures like failure in school, family troubles, and feelings
of social and physical as well as mental inferiority. They seek escape in books. They need literature that
will take them away from the ill-effects of the increasing social, political, economic, and religious tension
and fears of the modern world.

9. The Need for Aesthetic Satisfaction

The need to adorn, to make beautiful, and to enjoy beauty is another human need. Man seeks aesthetic
satisfaction. In one form or another and at various degrees of taste. The development of the child’s

Note: Write the answer of your activity and assessment/self-check in a yellow sheet paper. While the answer
of your assignment in your notebook.
 aesthetic tastes depends not only upon his innate capabilities but also the material given to him and
how it is presented.

Reading interest of children is a sequential development from one age level to the next. The
developmental preferences provide a scientific basis in the preparation and selection of their reading
material.

a. Before the age of two years

Reading interests arise from experience that go back to early infancy. It is observed in the
child’s handling of books, his interest in looking at pictures, his poses as though he is reading
and making baby sounds as he looks at the pictures, and his desire for story telling being
read too.

b. From three to six years

At this age, children show love for factual stories, rhymes, jingle stories, with attractive e
illustrations that can be discussed with an older person. They are interested in “what
happened”, “what could happen” and fanciful stories.

c. From six to seven years

These ages of children do not read too well yet. Their literature is simple in content and
style and often they are read to them by adults. Children want stories about children of their
own kind. They like funny stories and animal tales.

d. Children eight and ten

Between the ages eight and ten children begin to read for themselves. Their interest is in
folk and fairy tales. They love stories about real children. Boys and girls have the same
reading interests.

e. Children from eleven to twelve

There are already differences in the reading interest of boys and girls. Girls show more
interest in stories about home life and domestic happenings, in romance and in quiet social
situations. Boys show greater interest in vigorous venture and aggressive action.

f. High school age level

This older group of children show interest in history, biography, magazine articles dealing in
social and natural environment. They read stories that deal with situations that are not only
impossible but nonsensical and they also read books about travel, nature, history,
description about other lands and people.

An adult person’s interests as well as the child’s interests undergo changes. This is also true
with their needs.

Every child is unique so his needs and interests, and reading ability should be fully
understood to serve as a guide in helping him select his reading materials.

Assignment:

1. Research on different titles of children’s literature suited to particular age level.

Assessment/Self-Check.

Note: Write the answer of your activity and assessment/self-check in a yellow sheet paper. While the answer
of your assignment in your notebook.
 In your own words, explain the following:

1. Literature is entertainment
2. There is a therapeutic value of literature that must be recognized.
3. Literature fulfills a need in the classroom which does not confine it too the language arts alone.

Note: Write the answer of your activity and assessment/self-check in a yellow sheet paper. While the answer
of your assignment in your notebook.