The exception to this breakneck pace occurred at story time. Any story
Carol read had a calming effect. However, when she began The Little House
in the Big Woods, the group was transfixed. When she finished the book,
they begged for more stories by Laura Ingalls Wilder. Carol told them more
about the author and said that in each book she portrayed herself at an
older age, so that the books became more difficult and harder to under-
“Do you think she’s your Grandmother?” That is a touching question-
and given the busy and complex lives of these inner-city children, it is
especially moving. A narrative underscoring closeness, family, and coopera-
tive work evoked for the children quieting and strengthening images such
as that of the grandmother. Those images brought calm and restfulness.
The stories also did what stories always do: They strengthened memory,
identity, and a sense of place and belonging.
From personal experience we know that children love family stories,
and that they beg again and again for the same ones over: about when you
were little, or the “olden days” or the time Daddy fell in the river, or The
list is endless. In these stories and in larger, cultural stories, the child locates
him- or herself in terms of particular heritage. These stories span genera-
tions and bind us together. But stories, as in this example, also have the
power to put the child in touch with experiences far beyond the child’s
immediate life and times-and in so doing, to place the child within the
universe of human experience understandable to all of us across epochs
and cultures. My teacher friend struck a powerful chord in these children-
not because the story was “relevant” to their own daily lives, but because
the story envisioned for them a possibility and gave form to a human
yearning and longing within them for deep roots and relatedness to others.
The Threat to Childhood
This classroom episode foreshadows four ideas and issues that I will
interrelate in this essay: (a) what the childhood perspective offers–and what
we would lose were we deprived of it; (b) current threats to childhood and
the efferte of theos thranta
stand; still they wanted the next one. So she continued–in the course of
the year completing three or four in the series–and the children sat in
rapt attention through each one. Story time became the center of calm in
this busy classroom, and the children forged stronger bonds with each other
through hearing the stories together. But the bond they formed with
Laura Ingalls Wilder was deeper. One day as the children were leaving the
story circle, Carol overheard one boy say to another, in heartfelt tones and
referring to Laura, “Do you think she’s your Grandmother?”
“Do you think she’s your Grandmother?” That is a touching question-
and given the busy and complex lives of these inner-city children, it is
especially moving. A narrative underscoring closeness, family, and coopera-
tive work evoked for the children quieting and strengthening images such
as that of the grandmother. Those images brought calm and restfulness.
The stories also did what stories always do: They strengthened memory,
identity, and a sense of place and belonging.
From personal experience we know that children love family stories,
and that they beg again and again for the same ones over: about when you
were little, or the “olden days,” or the time Daddy fell in the river, or… The
list is endless. In these stories and in larger, cultural stories, the child locates
him- or herself in terms of particular heritage. These stories span genera-
