Children's literature, when used appropriately in conjunction with textbooks, can become a powerful teaching tool that builds relevant prior knowledge, capitalizes on the student's skill in reading narrative, engenders interest and motivation, and consequently promotes a deeper understanding and appreciation of the content in both trade books and textbooks. By their very nature, textbooks can provide only limited coverage of a topic, and teachers must identify concepts that can be further developed by having children read trade books. This approach to content area instruction requires the teacher to be familiar with a great variety of children's books. To make selection easier, teachers can use annotated subject guide indices to current children's books. After the books are selected and read by the teacher, they can be presented to the student and can be very effective if presented as a schema and interest builder before children read the text. Knowing which concepts and information will be met later in the textbooks, teachers reading stories orally can easily highlight key passages by reading them with particular emphasis. When stories are being read independently or in small groups, teachers can alert students to these passages prior to reading. Trade books are also effective as elaboration and extension of content and concept acquisition during and after reading the text. Finally, after reading trade books and textbooks, students should be engaged in activities that allow them to assess what they have learned, to interpret their knowledge in some way, and, thereby, to personalize it. (HOD)