A recent survey by the charity SCOPE of families with children with disabilities in education revealed that many are frustrated by the lack of images of disabled characters in books. In response, the charity has launched a new project, In the Picture, which aims to promote the inclusion of disabled children in children’s picture books.
The campaign is not calling for disabled characters to be placed at the centre of books, but simply for them to be represented in scenes alongside other characters, in the same way that has become the norm for characters of different ethnicities.
Author Evelyn Foster, who has written a children’s book, Alan and the Animals, to support the project, said: “There is a growing recognition within educational publishing that diversity needs to be recognised. The hope is that if disabled children are better represented in books, they will be better represented in life”.
www.childreninthepicture.org.uk
