adapting history for children's books

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>>2109244
Check out the "We Were There" series from the 50s and 60s. They did a pretty good job of inserting child viewpoint characters into historical events to get kids interested in history.

Somewhat related, but I had to read a ton of children's novels set in WWII for a class last year and it was interesting to see the distinct differences between the books written by authors from Europe and authors from North America.

Aside from the most obvious difference--North American authors tend to write books that take place on the North American homefront--when it came to books that did take place in Europe, European authors were more apt to write books that contained what American authors would have considered too dark, gritty, or 'adult' for books aimed at children. Graphic descriptions of blood and death and dead bodies, mentions or even descriptions of rape, descriptions of ordinary people doing horrible things, etc, essentially not shying away from the violence of the situation when compared to novels written by Americans set in the same locations or types of events, which might contain death or violence but described it in such a bland or 'safe' way ("The bullet whizzed through the air and hit its mark. He was dead" versus a European book which described someone being shot and seeing the blood spray out and seeing their brain matter and smelling shit in the air).

In many cases, the European authors either experienced the war themselves, had their parents live through it, or were related to people who lived through the horrors of the war in Europe when compared to the American authors, who either had no direct ties to the war or whose relatives did not experience it directly either.

>>2109309
did they ever do the Donner Party?

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Ayyyyy, one of the better books about history I've read as a kid. I think even historical fiction can lead to an interest in history for kids

>>2109796
most of the Scholastic 'diary' books (they had Dear America, Royal Diaries, My Name is America--then there's the international series, Dear Canada, I Am Canada, My Australian Story, etc) were pretty good. Although I've seen kids get confused when they think the diaries are real.

>>2109244
>A Dear America Book
>My Name is America
Christ, Americans lay it on a bit thick

>>2109864
The covers had "A Dear America book" on them because it was a spin-off of Dear America and they wanted to draw in the fans of the Dear America series to buy the new books. "My Name is America" is the name of the "boy journal" series, to differentiate it from the "girl diary" series of Dear America. The international Scholastic diary series' do the same thing.

>>2109855
>Although I've seen kids get confused when they think the diaries are real.

I can understand children being confused, but grown adults thinking they're actual journals, and then getting mad when they find out they're not, is what boggles my mind.