By Rachel Satter, OSU College of Education
My love of reading dates back to my childhood. I come from a family of voracious readers, and some of my favorite early memories are of going to the library each week to pick out new books. That love followed me into my career as an elementary teacher, where reading aloud to students was always one of the highlights of my day. Those early questions stayed with me as I moved through my doctoral program and into teacher education, shaping how I thought about the relationship between books, identity, and learning in K–12 classrooms.
Fast forward to 2021, when I was a TA for a writing methods course during my doctoral work in Connecticut. The professor—who was also my mentor—and I often talked about how teacher candidates didn’t yet have a strong frame of reference for high-quality children’s literature, or for how books could be used to model far more than just writing skills and strategies. That’s when I began imagining what it might look like for a teacher preparation program to have something called The Learning Lab. (I’ve always loved alliteration!) The Learning Lab would be a space filled with culturally responsive children’s books that OSU teacher candidates and Department of Educational Practice and Research (DEPR) faculty could use both in coursework and in K–12 classrooms.
A core idea in culturally responsive teaching is that classrooms should provide students with windows, mirrors, and doors (Bishop, 1990). In other words, students should be able to see themselves—and others—reflected in the learning materials around them. One of the most powerful ways to make that happen is through the books we place in children’s hands.
“Books are sometimes windows, offering views of worlds that may be real or imagined… these windows are also sliding glass doors, and readers have only to walk through in imagination… When lighting conditions are just right, however, a window can also be a mirror.” (Bishop, 1990)
As my work in teacher education deepened and eventually led me to Oregon State University, those early questions about books and belonging in K–12 classrooms only became more urgent. In Spring 2025, a CTL Mini-Grant allowed my colleague Dr. Amanda Kibler and I to begin bringing the Learning Lab to life in OSU’s College of Education (CoEd). The project aligned with Principle 1 of the OSU Quality Teaching Framework—“Champion a culture of diverse, equitable, and inclusive learning”—as well as recent statewide policies on social-emotional learning and early literacy, and the College of Education’s mission to “prepare educators as change agents in diverse communities.”
When Fall 2025 began, we knew that for the Learning Lab to truly serve CoEd faculty and students, they needed a voice in what it would contain. Emails were sent to DEPR faculty in October 2025 and again in January inviting them to suggest titles via a shared Google Doc. We asked them to think about the courses they teach and the kinds of assignments where children’s literature might play a meaningful role. I also reached out to our senior cohort, recognizing that their time student teaching gave them insight into which students and communities are often underrepresented in classroom libraries.
The final book list drew from multiple high-quality, award-winning sources, including:
- Coretta Scott King Awards
- Pura Belpré Awards
- America’s Awards
- Tomás Rivera Awards
- SocialJusticeBooks.org
Across four orders placed in Fall 2025 and January 2026, nearly 200 children’s and professional texts were purchased. We also invested in a rolling book cart so the Learning Lab could move with us—bringing these stories into courses and classrooms throughout Furman Hall.
What began as a simple idea during a conversation about teacher preparation has now become a shared resource for our community. The Learning Lab is still growing, but its purpose is clear: to make sure future teachers have access to books that open windows, offer mirrors, and invite every child to step through the door into learning.
About the author: Rachel Satter is an Assistant Professor of Practice in the College of Education’s Department of Educational Practice and Research. Her work with preservice teachers centers on social and emotional learning (SEL) and supports teacher candidates in creating inclusive, culturally responsive learning environments for all students.
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