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Introduction
"Mirror mirror on the wall, who's the fairest of them all?" In today's ever changing multicultural society, it is imperative for early childhood educators to be adept at facilitating the learning and progress of all children. In the United States, children of color make up about 40% of the population, and across the world children of color make up approximately 70% of the population. A primary goal in early childhood programs is to welcome and embrace the diversity of children and families in today's multicultural society.
Therefore, early childhood educators need to hone their interpersonal skills, increase their knowledge about different cultures, and facilitate learning activities that compliment children from diverse populations. These efforts can be supported by incorporating culturally-specific literature that is reflective of all children and their families into daily reading practices. Culturally specific books define characters as members of a specific cultural group with details like family relationships, religion, language, names, and illustrations that portray many cultural details (Bishop, 1992).
All children need to be exposed to positive images that represent their culture and themselves in the literature they are hearing and reading. Reading to young children from culturally diverse, family-centered literature benefits children of all backgrounds (Brinson, 2005). Hence, pivotal to facilitating change in the instructional approach of early childhood educators is acquisition of a wealth of knowledge about multicultural children's literature, including both what we refer to as "mirror" books and "window" books.
Mirror books are those that reflect and expand upon the culture of the child reading the book, thus reinforcing the culture of that child. Window books, in contrast, offer the child an opportunity to learn about other cultures by providing a window into new experiences.
What follows is information culled from a summary of a survey of early childhood educators related to multicultural literature. The summary includes and highlights an analysis of the data and implications for educational practices.
Methodology
The purpose of this study was to assess the knowledge of early childhood educators about multicultural literature for children. I developed an instrument entitled "Survey of Multicultural Children's Literature" and administered it to preservice and inservice educators in Shelby County, Tennessee. A total of 113 early childhood educators completed the instrument; 33 were preservice teachers and...