This article draws on a careful study of series fiction read in the 1950s to explore how stereotypes feature in the development of a young reader's competence in learning to process stories in print. Five categories of stereotype are teased out: "embodied stereotypes," understood through physical experience; "working stereotypes," discerned…

This article argues that if we paid attention to the local situation of a reader the way we attend to the life story of an author, we might gain a very different understanding of children's literacy. It explores the literate approaches of a single child exploring a single theme--the settler culture as represented in a variety of materials…

Children learn to read at approximately the same stage in life as they start to master their physical environment. This article argues that some of the same mapping and schema-building strategies inform each activity, and draws on examples from a broad range of children's books to support the idea that reading fiction and mapping one's local…

Changes in television technology have fostered changes in how we view fiction on television. This article explores some of these changes in the context of the teenage series, "Felicity" (WBTV, 1998-2002). It draws comparisons with the experience of reading series fiction in print, referring to the children's print series, "The Beverly Gray College…

Explores questions of paratext and spin-off text through an investigation of web sites and other forms of satellite texts relating to three series of novels for young people: the Harry Potter novels by J.K. Rowling, "His Dark Materials" by Philip Pullman, and the Disc-world novels of Terry Pratchett. (SG)

States that "Little Women" has appeared in many guises and many media; explores what the process of reworking has done to the story and its impact on readers' literary experiences. Looks at some of the fictional worlds created by the different films and subsequent novelizations; turns to the kinds of packaged texts produced by the publishing…

Uses "The Secret Garden" as the subject of a case study examining how particular stories take on multiple forms and versions in today's multimedia world. Discusses 18 different versions of "The Secret Garden." Raises a number of questions about the plurality of story versions available to children and how they respond to the various versions. (TB)

Explores Laura Ingalls Wilder's "Little House" books as a series of seven books of increasing complexity, to cast light on the processes of reading development. Examines ways Wilder used to help her reader develop. (SR)

Looks at implications of children meeting stories and storybook characters not only through books and videos but through anything from toys and games to pajamas. (RS)

Asserts that meanings are made socially, and explores how narrative connects with and feeds into the society which surrounds it. Examines the account of Ramona Quimby by Beverly Cleary, and how it demonstrates the role of narrative. (PRA)

Describes the responses of one English teacher recorded in a journal throughout her second reading of Margaret Mahy's novel, "Dangerous Spaces." Considers how later rereadings of the novel were influenced by earlier readings. Shows how one reader can fail to do justice to a book when reading it alone. (HB)

Discusses the intertextuality and metafiction of children's literature for beginning readers; specifically Allan Ahlberg's "Ten in a Bed." (MG)