......................................................................................................................................................iii Acknowledgements ......................................................................................................................................v Introduction / First Things ............................................................................................................................1 Chapter One: Educational Narratives ..........................................................................................................6 Proposal: Ethics + Literature Current Educational Ideologies Current Literature Standards Chapter Two: Moral Imagination ...............................................................................................................21 Moral Imagination as a Historical Concept Moral Imagination as a Cognitive Function Moral Imagination and Literature Chapter Three: Inviting Books in the Classroom ........................................................................................34 Ethics and Literature in the Middle Grades Literature as an Invitation to Speak Literature as an Invitation to Dialogue Literature as an Invitation to Intellectual Inquiry Literature as Invitation to Tell One’s Own Story Literature as Invitation to Participate in a Society and the Culture Literature as Invitation to Self-Definition Chapter Four: Three Middle Grades Texts .................................................................................................56 Jacqueline Woodson’s brown girl dreaming Mildred Taylor’s Roll of Thunder, Hear My Cry Lois Lowry’s The Giver