Fifty Years in Curricula: The First Croatian Course in Children`s Literature

The studying of literary techniques and methods in children's literature started in the late 19th century, and the first accounts of the history of Croatian children's literature appeared in this period. However, the awareness that it is necessary to include the teaching of children's literature, based on the findings of scholarly research, into higher education curricula developed slowly. The paper describes the history of the process of gradual inclusion of children's literature as a topic in the higher education. The first courses including the study of children's literature appeared in teacher training institutions after WWII. The first course in which children's literature was included to a substantial extent, while the course name also contained the term "children's literature" was The Culture of Oral and Written Expression with Children's Literature. Such a course was delivered for the first time at Croatian teacher training colleges probably in 1961.