Developmental Needs of Middle Grade Readers, a guest post by Sarah Lariviere

Recently, I had a dynamic conversation on the podcast “The S* No One Tells You About Writing” in which the interviewer, Bianca Marais, asked me to talk about the difference between writing for adults and for children. She noted that sometimes, her listeners submit manuscripts for children’s books that, despite featuring youthful main characters, read “adult.”  

Before I became an author, I was a social worker, practicing in schools and community clinics with children and families. My master’s topic was bibliotherapy—using books for therapeutic work.

Bianca’s question prompted me to return to the frameworks I relied upon as a therapist. In my response, I describe what I consider the heart of the discrepancy between writing for children vs. adults: they have divergent developmental needs. I also make the case that there’s a huge difference between writing for middle grade vs. young adult readers. Because the gap between the developmental needs of these readers is substantial. 

It’s true that pre-adolescents and adolescents have, in the most general terms, the same requirement: to develop a strong sense of self, a feeling of security and stability that will allow them to use good judgment and take appropriate risks as they move into the relative independence of adulthood.

But for most kids, this task at age 12 looks wildly different than it does at age 17.

For middle grade readers, group membership is emotionally central. It’s a stage when kids seek out circles of friends, teams, families, and other communities where they can experiment with expressing themselves. Be seen, validated, and accepted.  

And, as many of us know from our work with middle grade kids, and remember from our own childhoods, or have witnessed as parents, the process of finding your people can be nothing short of excruciating. Being excluded from a group can be devastating—even traumatic.

Alternatively, feeling as if you’re part of the wrong group, perhaps wearing a mask to hide your true self, interests, and values, can be exhausting, and undermine your emotional health.

Adolescents have a different developmental requirement, one that builds upon group membership but branches out from it: they need to individuate. Separate from the groups they’re tied to. Define themselves independently. Experiment with pulling away from those upon whom they’ve relied for advice and support.

This crucial task allows teens to set off on more independent adventures, cultivating their ability to make the decisions that will shape their adult lives.

Which is why the teenage years, even in the happiest of homes, are alive with arguments and strife. The next time your teenager explodes at you, pat yourself on the back. They’re precisely where they need to be.

So we’re all educators, we pretty much know these things, have observed or absorbed them intuitively. How should our knowledge of developmental stages impact the library?

Well, as so many of you have pointed out in this series, when we’re missing new books specifically targeted to middle grade readers, we’re failing to meet their needs. Specifically, we can’t help them navigate their deepest, most anxiety-provoking concern: the mucky, heart-wrenching terrain of being in or out of the club.

I’ll never forget the books that spoke to me in private whispers as I crouched in the aisles of the middle school library, reading in secret, terrified that I’d never fit in anywhere, ever. Judy Blume’s Blubber, in which the cruelty of kids is unvarnished, inviting the reader to empathize, feel outraged, feel less alone. Katherine Paterson’s The Great Gilly Hopkins, where family is the group, and fiercely soulful Gilly both desires the foster family she’s given, and is terrified of being vulnerable with them, exposing her already wounded heart. Then there’s Victor, in Daniel Pinkwater’s Lizard Music, who discovers a land of musical lizards that brought me, and zillions of other weirdo kids in the 1980s, comfort in the idea that maybe, just maybe, there’s a world out there where the stuff we’re drawn to makes perfect nonsense.

The need for books for kids age 11-15 that go deep on fitting in—or not fitting in—is unchanging. And while many YA books also address this theme, the beauty of middle grade is that the stories can be a little less fraught with older concerns, like sex, assault, abuse of alcohol, drugs. There aren’t clear lines, of course. Middle grade can touch on these topics too.

But the beautiful thing is, they don’t have to.  

Not yet.

Kids will always gravitate toward the books they need the most. And, of course, the books their librarians recommend. Libraries and bookstores with rich middle grade sections give young readers a chance to explore a diverse range of tales of kids who are hovering between the magical realm of little-kid-ness, and the powerful, hormone-heavy fantasy-lands of teens on the verge of adulthood.

Kids who are between one stage and the next.

Kids who need to know that although they may not fit into those other sections, they don’t have to face the awkward weirdness of this tender age alone.

Meet the author

Sarah Lariviere is an award-winning novelist who lives in Los Angeles. In her forthcoming YA duology, Riot Act (Knopf, July 2024), an alternate history set in 1991, theater kids fight for freedom of expression. Her debut novel, The Bad Kid (Simon & Schuster), was an Edgar Award finalist. Her second novel, Time Travel for Love and Profit (Knopf), was designated an Amazing Audiobook by the American Library Association. Sarah studied theater at Oberlin College and earned a master’s degree in social work from Hunter College in New York City, where she specialized in casework with children and families. She’s inspired by experimenting in her wild gardens, which were featured in the Los Angeles Times. Learn more about Sarah at SarahLariviere.com.

About Riot Act

Punk rock meets Orwell’s 1984 in this story of a group of theater kids who take on a political regime, perfect for readers who love books by A.S. King and Marie Lu.

In an alternate 1991, the authoritarian US government keeps tabs on everybody and everything. It censors which books can be read, what music can be listened to, and which plays can be performed.

When her best friend is killed by the authorities and her theater teacher disappears without a trace, Gigi decides to organize her fellow Champaign High School thespians to put on a production of Henry VI. But at what cost?

ISBN-13: 9780593479957
Publisher: Random House Children’s Books
Publication date: 07/16/2024
Age Range: 14 – 17 Years

Filed under: Guest Post