Co-Constructing Strengths-Based Views of Disability With Young Children: Interrogating and Disrupting Ableism in Children's Literature

• In Event: Critical Responses to Literature: Using Texts for Social Justice

Abstract

Social justice and anti-bias programs have historically neglected ableism and ignored disability as an identity. However, students with disabilities typically receive most of their education in general classroom settings, and validating the experiences of all students is essential to move toward equitable, inclusive, just educational opportunities. Very few picturebooks depict main characters with a disability in strengths-based ways, and no research has explored how young children respond to main characters with a disability in picturebooks. During a 10-week intervention in a rural school I shared picturebooks featuring strengths-based representations of disability in read-alouds with 1st and 2nd grade students. Dialogic discussions were analyzed to explore how young children responded to main characters with a disability in picturebooks.

Author

• H. Emily Hayden, Strategic Education Research Partnership
  Presenting Author