About the Author

Rebecca J. Lukens graduated with honors from Concordia College in Minnesota, earned an M.A. from Syracuse University, and next worked on the editorial staff of a children's encyclopedia in New York.  After a year on the faculty of St. Olaf College followed by her marriage, she taught at New York State College, Albany, and later at Ohio University, Chillicothe. After publication of a few children's stories, Miami University Department of English hired Lukens to teach Children's Literature–not "Kiddy Lit"–as well as technical and expository writing.

Jacquelin J. Smith is a career educator whose experience spans grades 2—8 through pre-service teaching. Children’s Literature has been a passion throughout her career, from literacy learning to connections across the curriculum. She has shared many cross-curricular teaching and learning strategies for science, social studies and math with children’s books at numerous professional conferences and in publications with the National Council of Teachers of Mathematics. A lifelong learner and Children’s Literature instructor at the University of Northern Iowa, her studies continually confirm both her appreciation for and belief in the power of critically examining children’s literature.

Cynthia Miller Coffel is the author of Thinking Themselves Free: Research on the Literacy of Teen Mothers. Her research in children's and young adult literature has appeared in journals such as The ALAN Review, Reader, and QSE. Her work won the Jeffrey E. Smith award for nonfiction from The Missouri Review in 2007, and her literary essays have twice been listed among the notable essays of the year in The Best American Essays series. Her PhD in literacy education is from the University of Iowa.