Resources for School of Education

Through this library session, students will learn to:

• Analyze the changes in publishing diversity in children’s books over time.
• Reflect on and describe the effect of representation in children’s literature in order to incorporate a DEI lens in selecting children’s literature for their (future) classroom.
• Explain the meaning of Rudine Sims Bishop’s windows, mirrors, and sliding glass doors concept and its significance for their students and literature within the classroom.
• Justify the need for a diverse selection of literature in the classroom.
• Evaluate books for cultural authenticity and suitability in a classroom setting.

"Books are sometimes windows, offering views of worlds that may be real or imagined, familiar or strange. These windows are also sliding glass doors, and readers have only to walk through in imagination to become part of whatever world has been created or recreated by the author. When lighting conditions are just right, however, a window can also be a mirror. Literature transforms human experience and reflects it back to us, and in that reflection we can see our own lives and experiences as part of the larger human experience. Reading, then, becomes a means of self-affirmation, and readers often seek their mirrors in books."

-Essay, "Mirrors, Windows, and Sliding Glass Doors" by Dr. Rudine Sims Bishop