幼児の身体障害への理解を援助する絵本教材

　本論は，身体障害を扱う絵本に焦点を当て，幼児期における障害理解を援助する絵本を収集及び分析し，絵本リストを作成すると同時に，それらの絵本の学びの要素や保育者の留意事項等について考察するものである。その結果，身体障害に関する絵本は，情緒的な理解の促進を目指したもの，盲導犬や車椅子等の障害児・者の生活を補助するものに関する知識の習得に重点が置かれたもの，その両方等，作者の思想や意図によって多種多様なものが存在することが分かった。それらを有効に活用するために保育者は，絵本に込められた学びの要素を読み取り，障害理解教育のねらいに合わせて適切な絵本を選択し，幼児の日常生活に般化されるように提示することが求められる。今後の課題は，リストを基にした現場実践から事例を収集し教育効果を分析すること，障害理解絵本が新たに出版される場合はその内容を吟味し，リストを随時更新して一層の実用化を図ること，が挙げられた。

Focusing on children’ s books about physical disabilities, this study involved the creation of a list of children’s books following the collection and analysis of children’ s books that help preschoolers gain understanding of disabilities. At the same time, the learning elements of those books and the points to note for preschool teachers were discussed. As a result, it was found that there is a wide range of children’s books about physical disabilities depending on the ideas and intentions of the writers; e.g., those that aim to promote emotional understanding, those that focus on gaining knowledge of items that assist the life of children/people with disabilities such as guide dogs and wheelchairs, and those that include both of these themes. In order to effectively utilize such children’ s books, preschool teachers must grasp the learning elements of the books, choose the appropriate book according to the target of their disability awareness education, and present the book’s content in ways that will enable the preschoolers to generalize the learnings to their everyday life. In the future, this study will be further developed by collecting cases of disability awareness education using children’ s books based on our list and analyzing their educational effects. In addition, any new children’ s book about disability awareness will be scrutinized and the list will be updated whenever necessary to enhance its practicality.