Guided by the importance of children's voices and perspectives, this study aims at finding the immigrant children's perspectives of books that share stories of early school experiences of immigrant children. Before working with children, there was a careful selection process and analyzing of the three picture books chosen for the study using critical content analysis and childism lenses. The participants are three Arab immigrant children at the age of 6 who are bilingual and attended school in the U.S for one year, at least. With acknowledgement to reader-response theory, the data collection process started with an introductory home visit, followed by three individual interactive read-aloud sessions using interviews, audio records, and observations. The data collection involved field notes of non-verbal responses of the participants and these notes supported analysis of the eight transcripts. Thematic analysis is used in analyzing the data of each story, followed by identifying finding themes across all three stories. The seven themes found across all three stories are discussed in the final chapter and include: Children can have empathy for characters, understand social injustices in the stories, be agents to change injustice in the stories, and are curious about different cultures. The children's personal stories shared during this research are the most valuable outcome because they reflect the real experiences of those most affected by the research topic. The study also explains how listening to immigrant children's personal stories is an act that supports justice and helps to fight against any kind of prejudice those children might face. The study emphasizes that children have the ability to engage in sophisticated conversations about themselves and their life experiences through the use of appropriate tools combined with believing in the children's rights.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:unt.edu/info:ark/67531/metadc1752399 |
| Date | 12 1900 |
| Creators | Alharbi, Sara Abdullah |
| Contributors | Mathis, Janelle, Castro, Dina Carmela, Templeton, Tran, González-Carriedo, Ricardo |
| Publisher | University of North Texas |
| Source Sets | University of North Texas |
| Language | English |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | Thesis or Dissertation |
| Format | vii, 192 pages, Text |
| Rights | Public, Alharbi, Sara Abdullah, Copyright, Copyright is held by the author, unless otherwise noted. All rights Reserved. |
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