Diverse Perspectives in Children's Literature

       Chapter eleven speaks on diverse literature in today's classroom. Diversity means to have a range of different things. So with incorporating  diverse literature in today's classroom it allows the child from a different culture and life experiences to develop insight and understanding of their own culture and values through books they will encounter at the local or school library.
         Their are so many benefits from using diverse literature in today's classroom: some are the benefits are:
1. It provides enjoyment of quality literature that meets the criteria of literary and artistic merit.
2.It presents information and knowledge about the historical and continuing contributions of the people of diverse cultures who live in the united states.
3.It connects children to the world by exposing them to diverse viewpoints other that the mainstream.
4.It fosters awareness, appreciation, and understanding of people who are different from and similar to themselves.
5. It promotes critical inquiry into issues of equal representation of how people of diverse cultures are depicted in all books.
         Instructing Diverse literature has categories and levels of understanding. One of the categories spoken about in the chapter is Multicultural Literature. This section was broken into Cultural Diversity which can be broken down into; Cultural neutral, culturally generic and culturally specific. There is also  Religious diversity  which includes American Indian Spirituality, Hinduism, Buddhism, Judaism and Islam. The last component of diverse literature is other diverse perspectives which can be broken into aging, gender equity, exceptionalities, language, social diversity and family structures.
       In conclusion of diverse perspectives in children's literature their are two different strategies you can do to teach critical literacy in the classroom. these two strategies are problem posing which is a strategy that requires the reader to use questions to engage in critical analysis such as: who is in the text/picture/situation? who is missing? The other strategies that  can be used is called alternative perspectives which is exploring viewpoints of different characters in a story or different people in real-life situations. Within the classroom the teacher can make connections across the school academic curriculum within reading and language arts, social studies, science and math. Each component area has it's own unique way of connecting to the topic diverse children's literature.