Children's literature (also called

Children's literature (also called juvenile literature) consists of the books, stories, and poems which are enjoyed by or targeted primarily at children. Modern children's literature is classified in different ways, including by genre or the intended age of the reader.
Children's literature has its roots in the stories and songs that adults told their children before publishing existed, as part of the wider oral tradition. Because of this it can be difficult to track the development of early stories. Even since widespread printing, many classic tales were originally created for adults and have been adapted for a younger audience. Although originally children's literature was often a re-writing of other forms, since the 1400s there has been much literature aimed specifically at children, often with a moral or religious message. To some extent the nature of children's fiction, and the divide between older children's and adult fiction became blurred as time went by and tales appealing to both adult and child had substantial commercial success.
Introduction
There is no single, widely accepted definition of children's literature.[1]:15-17 It can be broadly defined as anything that children read,[2] but a more useful definition may be fiction, poetry and drama intended for and used by children and young people,[3]:xvii a list to which many add non-fiction. Nancy Anderson of the College of Education at the University of South Florida defines children's literature as all books written for children, "excluding works such as comic books, joke books, cartoon books, and nonfiction works that are not intended to be read from front to back, such as dictionaries, encyclopedias, and other reference material".[4]
Classifying children's literature is equally confusing. As the International Companion Encyclopedia Of Children's Literature says, "The boundaries of genre... are not fixed but blurred."[1]:4 Sometimes no agreement can be reached even on whether a given work is best categorized as adult or children's literature, and many books are marketed for both adults and children. J. K. Rowling's series about Harry Potter was written and marketed for children, but it was so popular among children and adults that The New York Times created a separate bestseller list for children's books to list them.[5]
When people think of children's literature they probably mean books, or at least print. But narratives existed before printing, and the roots of some best-known children's tales go back to storytellers of old.[6]:30 Seth Lerer, in the opening of Children's Literature: A Reader's History from Aesop to Harry Potter, says "This book presents a history of what children have heard and read... The history I write of is a history of reception".[7]:2
[edit] Classification
Children's literature can be divided a number ways. Two useful divisions are genre and intended age of the reader.
Children's literature by genre
A literary genre is a category of literary composition. Genres may be determined by technique, tone, content, or length. Anderson lists six categories of children's literature, with some significant subgenres:[8]
• Picture books, including board books, concept books (teaching an alphabet or counting for example), pattern books, and wordless books.
• Traditional literature, including folktales, which convey the legends, customs, superstitions, and beliefs of people in past times. This genre can be further broken down into myths, fables, legends, and fairy tales.
• Fiction, including fantasy, realistic fiction and historical fiction.
• Non-fiction.
• Biography and autobiography.
• Poetry and verse.
Children's literature by age category
The criteria for these divisions are vague and books near a borderline may be classified either way. Books for younger children tend to be written in very simple language, use large print, and have many illustrations. Books for older children use increasingly complex language, normal print, and fewer, if any, illustrations.
• Picture books appropriate for pre-readers or ages 0–5.
• Early Reader Books appropriate for children age 5–7. These books are often designed to help a child build his or her reading skills.
• Chapter book appropriate for children ages 7–12.
o Short chapter books, appropriate for children ages 7–9.
o Longer chapter books, appropriate for children ages 9–12.
• Young-adult fiction appropriate for children age 12–18
History
According to Aspects and Issues in the History of Children's Literature from the International Research Society for Children's Literature, the development of literature for children anywhere in the world follows the same basic path. All children's literature, whatever its current stage of development, begins with spoken stories, songs and poems. In the beginning the same tales that adults tell and enjoy are adapted for children. Then stories are created specifically for children, to educate, instruct and entertain them. In the final stage literature for children is established as separate from that of adults, having its own genres, divisions, expectations and canon.[12]:x-xi The development of children's literature is influenced by the social, educational, political and economic resources of the country or ethnic group.[1]:654

The value of children's literature
There are many authors expressing the value of children’s literature. The conclusion is as follows.
1.To help children be ready , fluency and encourage a love of reading for leisure purposes.
2. To enhance skills and personal values, attitudes, habits, morals, and culture which can be media led to the pursuit of knowledge and experience in various.
3.To allows a child to be entertained and meet the interests with reading
4. To help children understand themselves and others as a thing in the past , information, knowledge, ideas and commentary on the things that will cause a world wide and update around the world.
5.To be funny and intelligence for children.
6. To Enhance the child's sense of security in life. There is hope in life. See the exit of intelligence.
7. As a source of inspiration for the children's imagination and creativity.



Authors’ expressing the value of children’s literature
• Poems for children help them celebrate the joy and wonder of their world. Humorous poems tickle the funny bone of their imaginations.
o Charles Ghigna (Father Goose)
• Good children's literature appeals not only to the child in the adult, but to the adult in the child.
o Anonymous
• Fairy tales are more than true: not because they tell us that dragons exist, but because they tell us that dragons can be beaten.
o G.K. Chesterton
• The destiny of the world is determined less by the battles that are lost and won, than by the stories it loves and believes in.
o Harold Goddard, The Meaning of Shakespeare
• There have been great societies that did not use the wheel, but there have been no societies that did not tell stories.
o Ursula K. LeGuin
• In our time, when the literature for adults is deteriorating, good books for children are the only hope, the only refuge.
o Isaac Bashevis Singer
• In every generation, children's books mirror the society from which they arise; children always get the books their parents deserve.
o Leonard S. Marcus
• The humble little school library...was a ramp to everything in the world and beyond, everything that could be dreamed and imagined, everything that could be known, everything that could be hoped.
o Lee Sherman, editor of Northwest Education
• We need metaphors of magic and monsters in order to understand the human condition.
o Stephen Donaldson
• We don't need lists of rights and wrongs, tables of do's and don'ts: we need books, time, and silence. 'Thou shalt not' is soon forgotten, but 'Once upon a time' lasts forever.
o Philip Pullman