Survey (or invite children to survey) what kinds of books are available in local bookstores. How much diversity is represented in their selections? Interview booksellers about their stock and how and why it is selected, and about what books customers tend to purchase. Share your conclusions here. 

I really enjoyed this assignment. I went to Barnes and Nobles and talked to a woman named Carole who runs the children’s section of the store. She knew a lot about all the books and things about children. She had mentioned some of the things we have already been discussing in our class. For example she mentioned that any book with pictures, lots of color, big font is good books for children. One of Carole’s personal favorites is Brown Bear Brown Bear by Bill Martin, Jr. and illustrated by Eric Carle. One of her overall favorites is Chicka Chicka Boom Boom, also by Bill Martin, Jr. and illustrated by Lois Ehlert because of the bright colors, big font, sing song sound when read aloud, repetition pattern of words, and it’s a great book for teaching the alphabet. Carole also pointed out that the book was a good tool for teaching the alphabet because it first shows you the lower case letters and then the uppercase letters, then finally it shows you both side by side. But, she said it is important to teach children first the lower case letters because when we write and read we mainly write and read lower case letters first. This is really a popular book with the kids that they often read during story time, which they do twice a week at Barnes and Nobles. 

There is a lot you can do with books with repetition, colors, numbers, animals, and ideas Carole explained. She mentioned that most parents don’t actually read to their children and when they do they don’t facilitate the full content and teaching a book could provide. During story time at the store they try to get the kids involved and talking about the books. Their goal is to keep kids engaged and learning more and more.  

Carole also explained to me the difference between chapter books and young reader’s books, which I was calling chapter books also. But actually those are more like novels for younger readers. An example of a very popular young reader’s book right now would be Eragon, which is the first book of a trilogy of children’s fantasy novels. An example of quality chapter books that Carole showed me is the Magic Tree House Collection, by Mary Pope Osborne. The cool things about these books are that they have a fiction book, which is about kids and something from the past, dinosaurs for example. The chapter book is all about their adventure. Then there is also a non fiction book that you can buy separately that is called a research guide and covers the historical aspect of that same story. So it would be about the true history of dinosaurs. Also what makes chapter books different from young readers “chapter books” is that they have illustrations, wide margins, and much larger text. Children start reading these kinds of chapter books between first and second grade.  

After sitting and talking with Carole for about a half an hour, while she grabbed books to show and point things out to me, I then walked around with all these different aspects of children’s literature in mind. The biggest thing I noticed is how nicely organized the children’s section is just as the rest of the store is. They have tables set up with the most popular buys, holiday tables for Easter, St. Patrick’s Day, and Women’s History Month. They also had tables for Award Winners (which Carole supplied me with all kind of pamphlets and hand outs of information on best sellers and award winners to buy), Disney, Fractured Fairy Tales, and a kids activity book table.