Research guides: Education: Children's Literature: Comics & Graphic Novels

From the Collection

The Cardboard Kingdom by Chad Sell
Call Number: JUV FIC S467C
Publication Date: 2018
Follows a neighborhood of kids who transform ordinary cardboard into fantastical homemade costumes as they explore conflicts with friends, family, and their own identity. Affirms the power of imagination and play during the most important years of adolescent identity-searching and emotional growth.
Undocumented: A Worker's Fight by Duncan Tonatiuh
Call Number: JUV FIC P288Y
Publication Date: 2018
Undocumented is the story of immigrant workers who have come to the United States without papers. The story is told via the ancient Mixtec codex-accordion fold-format.
Surviving the City by Natasha Donovan (Illustrator); Tasha Spillett-Sumner
Call Number: JUV FIC S7557S
Publication Date: 2018
A story about womanhood, friendship, resilience, and the anguish of a missing loved one. Miikwan and Dez are best friends. Miikwan's Anishinaabe; Dez is Inninew. Together, the teens navigate the challenges of growing up in an urban landscape.

Graphic Adaptations

Anne Frank's Diary: The Graphic Adaptation by Anne Frank; David Polonsky (Illustrator); Ari Folman (Adapted by)
Call Number: JUV FIC F668A
Publication Date: 2018
Macbeth (Manga Classics) by William Shakespeare; Crystal S. Chan (Adapted by); Julien Choy (Illustrator)
Call Number: JUV FIC C5517M
Publication Date: 2019
The Handmaid's Tale by Margaret Atwood; Renée Nault (Illustrator; Adaptated by)
Call Number: JUV FIC N298H
Publication Date: 2019

How to find graphic novels at the OISE Library

There are hundreds of comics and graphic novels in the Children's Literature collection at the OISE Library. To find them:

Go to LibrarySearch select "Advanced Search" on the right hand side of the page.
Navigate to "Search Scope" and select "OISE/UT Library."
Under "Search Filters" change "Any Field" to "Subject" and enter "graphic novels" as a search term.
Select "Search" in the bottom right hand side.
Use "Filter your results" on the left hand side to narrow your results by selecting "OISE/UT Library" under "Library" and "Graphic Novels" under "Subject."

Library Resources for Teaching Comics in the Classroom

Understanding Comics: The Invisible Art by Scott McCloud
Publication Date: 1994
The bestselling international classic on storytelling and visual communication. Praised throughout the cartoon industry, Scott McCloud's Understanding Comics is a seminal examination of comics art: its rich history, surprising technical components, and major cultural significance. Explore the secret world between the panels, through the lines, and within the hidden symbols of a powerful but misunderstood art form.
Worth a Thousand Words: Using graphic novels to teach visual and verbal literacy by Meryl J. Jaffe; Talia Hurwich
Publication Date: 2018
Worth a Thousand Words details how and why graphic novels are complex texts with advanced-level vocabulary, and demonstrates how to read and analyze these texts. It includes practical advice on how to integrate these books into both ELA and content-area classrooms and provides an extensive list of appropriate graphic novels for K-8 students, lesson suggestions, paired graphic/prose reading suggestions, and additional resources for taking these texts.
The Graphic Novel Classroom by Maureen Bakis
Publication Date: 2014
Every teacher knows that keeping adolescents interested in learning can be challenging--The Graphic Novel Classroom overcomes that challenge. In these pages, you will learn how to create your own graphic novel in order to inspire students and make them love reading. Create your own superhero to teach reading, writing, critical thinking, and problem solving! Readers will learn how to incorporate graphic novels into their classrooms in order to: Teach twenty-first-century skills such as interpretation of content and form; Improve students' writing and visual comprehension; Captivate both struggling and proficient students in reading; Promote authentic literacy learning; Develop students' ability to create in multiple formats. This all-encompassing resource includes teaching and learning models, text-specific detailed lesson units, and examples of student work.
Teaching Graphic Novels in the Classroom, Grades 7-12 by Ryan J. Novak
Publication Date: 2013
Teaching Graphic Novels in the Classroom describes different methods teachers may use to begin teaching graphic literature to new readers. The first chapter of the book is dedicated to the history of the medium and runs from the earliest days of comic books through the growing popularity of graphic novels. Chapters 2-7 focus on different genres and include an analysis and lessons for 1-2 different novels, creator profiles, assignments, ways to incorporate different media in connection with each book, chapter summaries, discussion questions, and essay topics. Chapter 8 provides direction for students to create their own graphic novel, with guidance from the writing process to creating the art.
Connecting Comics to Curriculum by Karen W. Gavigan; Mindy Tomasevich
Publication Date: 2011
Here is the essential guide for librarians and teachers who want to develop a quality, curriculum-based graphic novel collection--and use its power to engage and inform middle and high school students.
Teaching Comics and Graphic Narratives: Essays on Theory, Strategy, and Practice by Lan Dong (Editor)
Publication Date: 2012
The essays in this collection discuss how comics and graphic narratives can be useful primary texts and learning tools in college and university classes across different disciplines. There are six sections: American Studies, Ethnic Studies, Women's and Gender Studies, Cultural Studies, Genre Studies, and Composition, Rhetoric and Communication. With a combination of practical and theoretical investigations, the book brings together discussions among teacher-scholars to advance the scholarship on teaching comics and graphic narratives--and provides scholars with useful references, critical approaches, and particular case studies.

Free Online Resources for Teaching Comics in the Classroom

Teaching Comics Guide from The Centre for Cartoon Studies
"This page both archives teaching content from National Association of Comics Art Educators, along with dozens of additional teaching comics resources for all ages developed by The Center for Cartoon Studies community."
Teaching with Comics - University of Lethbridge
"A very comprehensive document that covers the history of comics as a literary medium. This project explores how comics are an imaginitive and diverse literary style that have a definite place in the ELA classroom. Includes a "dissection of a comic book" and a list of recommended comics for the classroom."
How Comics Work - University of Winnipeg
"To facilitate students’ reading and appreciation of This Place, One Book University of Winnipeg has commissioned a 20–page comic, illustrated by Ojibwe comics creator Alice RL. How Comics Work walks students through the basic terms and concepts of comics studies in order to encourage discussion of how This Place works as a visual-verbal text."

Education: Children's Literature

From the Collection

Graphic Adaptations

How to find graphic novels at the OISE Library

Library Resources for Teaching Comics in the Classroom

Free Online Resources for Teaching Comics in the Classroom

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