Beyond Tolerance. Real World Literacy Teaching and Learning for PreK-6 by Dierdre G. Paul (review)

Beyond Tolerance by Dierdre G. Paul is a book that presents itself as a “hopeful, optimistic book focused on creating positive and sustained social change through…multiethnic children’s literature” (Paul 1). This book describes the need for diverse perspectives and explains important reasons for using children’s literature that is inclusive of all cultures. This text is a meaningful resource for elementary classroom teachers that connects children’s literature with reading strategies for the K-6 classroom.

Paul titles her second chapter “What Are the Benefits of Multiethnic Children’s Literature? And Who Actually Benefits?” Her answer is clear: all children! She describes society as “a new, multiethnic world order,” which reflects a pluralistic society, and makes the case that multiethnic children’s literature has an important place in this world. She presents an overview of the neglect and mistreatment of people of color in US education. This is followed with a brief history of children’s literature from African American authors, including a brief discussion of Asian American and Latinx authors as well. In this text, Paul presents multiethnic children’s literature as a tool to create dialogue, thinking, and action around their racial or ethnic identity. As classrooms are becoming increasingly diverse and the teaching force is still monolingual and predominantly white, it is important to feature diverse selections of children’s books in the curriculum.

High-quality children’s literature can provide messages about race and ethnicity that are inclusive and relatable. Paul makes the case that children, even those from the dominant culture, develop more complex and critical thinking with diverse cultural understanding. An important contribution of this text are the criteria to select high-quality children’s literature. Teachers often feel anxious about selecting the “wrong” book or approaching controversial topics in their classroom, but this should not stop them from trying. Paul laments the cry of teachers for a “good list” of multiethnic books; instead, she suggests deepening the skills needed to identify such books.

The last few chapters of the book focus on specific literacy strategies for preschool learners, K-3 learners, and 4-6 learners. These chapters build on the inclusion of multiethnic children’s literature and provide specific ways to incorporate a library of quality picturebooks and chapter books with quality age-appropriate literacies strategies.

The appendices provide a variety of resources for teachers related to both multiethnic children’s literature and general literacy strategies. The appendices cover milestones in the development of multicultural literature, guidelines for selecting books or texts for independent reading, K-3 literacy assessments, a home reading survey, and a guide for an informal reading conference. These resources are supplemented with reading lists based on the winners of various ethnic book awards (Coretta Scott King Book Awards, The Américas Award, the Pura Belpré Award, The Best Jewish Children’s Books of 2014, and ten books on Italian American heritage).

This book covers extensive information in a short amount of space—there are ninety-eight pages of explanation and forty-four pages of resources. The historical perspective and background on multicultural children’s literature found in this book are quite important; however, if there is one criticism of this book that we have, it is that it attempts to cover too much material without explaining concepts in depth. Nevertheless, we would not hesitate to recommend this text as a resource for teachers, and we feel that this would be a great initial tool for anyone who reads with children. Additional resources are needed to fully understand the differing cultural perspectives and the ways that multiethnic children’s literature should be used to extend understanding. This book is a starting point for understanding why and how diverse children’s literature should be a central component of the curriculum.