Vardell's Take on Historical Fiction and Informational Text

Vardell states that historical fiction can be one of the hardest genres to promote to young readers. I, personally, have never been a fan of historical fiction. Historical fiction is described as being fiction with a setting that is historical. There is no specific time frame that text is considered to be historical or not. Vardell points out that well-written HF contains: compelling characters, engaging plots, and meaningful themes. HF should give the reader a sense of participation in the past events. There are many types of historical fiction: US History, World History, Historical Series, Historical Picture Books, and Blending Genres.

Vardell gives very important criteria for evaluating historical fiction. The categories are characters, plot, setting, theme, style, and stereotyping. The reader should be able to identify with the protagonist of the story. The characters of the story should be doing realistic things from that time period. The plot should also be accurate to the time period. The setting of historical fiction text should be vividly described, according to Vardell. The theme of the story should reflect the attitudes, values, and morals of the times, but also be relevant to today. Since these often differ so greatly, this is often a challenge. The style of writing should capture the times with the dialect or language pattern of people from that time. Vardell also warns about selecting text with offensive stereotypes. As times change, so do attitudes. What once was okay and a general mindset of people, can now be highly offensive.

Informational text is described as nonfiction text. There are several types of informational books: survey books, photo essays, concept books, social histories, informational storybooks, activity books, trivia books, series books and reference tools, magazines, and more! Vardell suggests the following categories to be taken into consideration when evaluating informational text: accuracy, organization, design, and style. The way the text is organized is important. Since informational books aren't always read entirely, it's important that the text is organized.The design of the book helps make the book more appealing to readers.  The style of the book is what takes if from being just a list of facts to an interesting collection of information.

Historical fiction books and informational books are both important parts of a media collection. Both genres provide an excellent opportunity for teachers to integrate each genre into the classroom!