MA Children's Literature (Distance Learning)

Program Overview

Roehampton's MA in Children's Literature offers an online, part-time format exploring the world of children's literature and how it shapes ideas about childhood. With a focus on critical and theoretical perspectives, the program includes modules on archives, research, and various forms and genres. Graduates can pursue careers in teaching, writing, publishing, and more, benefiting from the university's membership in the National Centre for Research in Children's Literature.

Program Outline

Degree Overview:

This unique course allows you to study children's literature in an online, flexible and part-time format from wherever you are in the world. Roehampton is ranked top ten in the UK for postgraduate student satisfaction (PTES 2022, 2023).

Outline:

Modules:

Level 7

Compulsory Modules:

• Critical and Theoretical Perspectives: This module introduces a range of critical and theoretical approaches to the study of children's literature, including Feminism and Gender Identity Politics, Psychoanalysis, Postcolonial approaches to literature, Queer Theory, Reader Response Theory, Carnivalesque approaches to literature, and Theories of Power.
Students will learn how to critically analyze a variety of fairy tales, short-form fiction, picturebooks, and poems.
• Archives and Research: This module introduces research using archival sources across a range of formats, genres, and methodological and disciplinary approaches.
It examines the many and varied roles that archives play, not only as sites for research but as arenas for debate, discovery, meaning-making and the shaping of identities. Students will learn skills ranging from conservation, handling and cataloguing to research methods and project design.

Optional Modules:

• British Children's Literature: Historical Perspectives: This module provides a critical overview of the origins and development of British children's literature from the late fifteenth century to the post-war period.
Students will read a range of classic and popular works produced and adapted for young readers, by authors such as Maria Edgeworth, Lewis Carroll and Mary Norton.
• Ecology, Environment, and Youth Culture: This module explores longstanding links between environmental discourse, youth cultures, and constructions of childhood.
It examines how children's literature conveys ecological messages and the image of the child in nature.
• Form and Genre 1: This module introduces students to some of the most important forms and genres in the field of children's literature, such as: the picturebook; graphic novels; YA fiction; verse novels; poetry; school-stories; adventure narratives and yarns; the Robinsonade; historical novels; or dystopian fiction.
• Form and Genre 2: This module continues the exploration of forms and genres in children's literature, building upon the content of Form and Genre 1.

Dissertation Modules:

• Creative Dissertation: This module allows students to further develop their creative writing and related research skills.
Students will create a portfolio of original creative writing (such as a novella, or series of picture-book scripts) and reflect critically on their writing process.
• Dissertation: This module is the capstone of the MA in Children's Literature, offering students the opportunity to develop their own project on an aspect of children's literature, childhood and literature, or children reading.

Structure:

The program is taught through a mixture of independent study, tutor feedback, and peer support. Students have access to an online learning environment, allowing them to work with digital materials, watch video lectures, and engage in learning activities. They can discuss ideas with other students through discussion boards and interact with their tutor in online seminars.

Teaching:

The program is taught through a mixture of independent study, tutor feedback, and peer support. Students have access to an online learning environment, allowing them to work with digital materials, watch video lectures, and engage in learning activities. They can discuss ideas with other students through discussion boards and interact with their tutor in online seminars.

Careers:

Graduates of MA Children's typically pursue careers in:

• Teaching
• Writing
• Children's publishing
• Librarianship
• Arts management
A Creative Writing Pathway has been designed for those with an ambition to write for children, allowing students to study writing from a practitioner's perspective.

Other:

Through this program, students become members of the National Centre for Research in Children's Literature (NCRCL), regarded as the premier institution for children's literature research in Britain. The University is also the exclusive Creative Partner of Barnes Children's Literature Festival, London’s largest event dedicated to children's writing.

Tuition Fees and Funding

UK Students September 2024 entry tuition fees (UK) Level of study Part-time MA £4,122 PGDip £2,748

• average fee per year
We offer a wide range of scholarships and bursaries. International Students September 2024 entry tuition fees (international) Level of study Part-time MA £7,875 PGDip £5,250
• average fee per year
We offer a wide range of scholarships and bursaries.