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“Recent Multicultural Literature for Children and Young Adults” Panel and “Using Poems to Get Students to Write” Presentation at Michigan Reading Association Conference in Grand Rapids on Saturday, March 11, 2017

Authors and scholars Janet Ruth Heller and Jennifer Burd will discuss “Recent Multicultural Literature for Children and Young Adults” at the Michigan Reading Association’s Conference at the DeVos Place Convention Center at 303 Monroe Ave NW, Grand Rapids, MI 49503 in the Gallery Overlook G room from 10:30 a.m. to 12 p.m. Multicultural literature and diverse books are important and open up new possibilities for students, teachers, and our society. Studying diverse texts enhances students’ self-esteem, respect for others, and critical thinking skills. Also, such books discourage bullying.  Panelists will use a multimedia presentation and hand out bibliographies of multicultural books.  Janet will also discuss “Using Poems to Get Students to Write” from 1 p.m. to 2:30 p.m. in the Ambassador West room of the Amway Hotel on March 11.  Her presentation is part of the “Lightning Rounds.”  The Amway Grand Plaza is located at 187 Monroe Ave NW, Grand Rapids, MI 49503.  For more information about the Michigan Reading Association Conference, please see the website https://www.michiganreading.org/conferences/annual-conference

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Janet Ruth Heller

I am the past president of the Michigan College English Association. I have a Ph.D. in English Language and Literature from the University of Chicago. I have published four poetry books: Nature's Olympics (Wipf and Stock, 2021), Exodus (WordTech Communications, 2014), Folk Concert: Changing Times (Anaphora Literary Press, 2012) and Traffic Stop (Finishing Line Press, 2011). My scholarly book, Coleridge, Lamb, Hazlitt, and the Reader of Drama, was published in 1990 by the University of Missouri Press. My fiction picture book about bullying for children, How the Moon Regained Her Shape (Arbordale, 2006; 7th edn. 2022), has won four national awards. My play The Cell Phone won fourth place in a national contest and was performed twice at the Fenton Village Players One-Act Play Festival on June 24-25, 2011 in Fenton, Michigan. Triton College produced another play, Pledging, as part of its Tritonysia Play Festival in May 2017. Choeofpleirn Press published Pledging in Rushing Through the Dark (2022).