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This qualitative research study, combining content analysis and semistructured interviews, is the first to look exclusively at characters with cancer in children's picturebooks.
"MARILYN'S FAMILY HAS ASKED ME to inform all of you that Marilyn has cancer.. .leukemia," Miss Wichelman, a teacher, tells her students in the beginning of the picturebook titled The Lemonade Club (Polacco, 2007). Until the late 20th century, such a fictional opportunity that allows children to explore a complex, painful subject would not have been found in a children's picturebook (S. Beckett, 2012). Recently, however, an awareness of the value of representation has demanded an expanded canon of texts that includes those concerning children with illnesses. As Bishop (1990) highlighted, when children see their experiences mirrored in texts, it affirms their identity and sense of belonging to the larger human experience. In contrast, if children cannot see themselves in books or "when the images they see are distorted, negative, or laughable, they learn a powerful lesson about how they are devalued" (p. x). Exclusion from literature can be particularly devastating for children with cancer because research examining lived experiences has consistently recognized isolation as a main theme (Bjork et al., 2009; Darcy et al., 2014; Sourkes, 2007).
Research shows that reading such texts to children with illnesses or disabilities has proven validating, comforting, and helpful in the development of a positive self-image (Goddard, 2011). By seeing their experiences reflected in a text about chemotherapy, children in active cancer treatment experienced reduced feelings of anxiety and stress, Schneider (2012) found. In her analysis of deaththemed picturebooks, Wiseman (2013) similarly noted that reading and responding to literature can be an effective method for children to process traumatic events. Exposing children without disabilities to these texts too has proven useful in building awareness, increasing understanding, and fostering welcoming social spaces for all children (Adomat, 2014; A. Beckett et al., 2010; Iaquinta & Hipsky, 2006; Matthew & Clow, 2007; Nasatir & Horn, 2003).
Despite such benefits, few picturebooks are available that feature children with disabilities and illnesses, and those that do exist have not always been held to the same standard as other picturebooks. As such, content analyses have been conducted examining the availability and quality of these books alongside their representation of disability....