Alexa is a children's book author having written, illustrated, and self-published her first picture book, "Hannah's Hats", when she was a Freshman at NYU. In her talk, Alexa explores and shares her passion for multilingualism, it's benefits, and more.

Alexa Pearce is a Junior from Little Rock, Arkansas. She is an avid Francophile, an expert scone baker, a wannabe runner, and fair-weather football fan. She's always loved children's literature; she wrote, illustrated, and self-published her first picture book, Hanna's Hats, when she was a Freshman at NYU. Inspired by the multilingualism pervasive in the NYU community, Alexa set out to research bilingual children's literature during her sophomore year, receiving a DURF grant from NYU along the way. Her research led her to develop a new kind of bilingual children's book utilizing the theory in bilingual pedagogy called "translanguaging," which gives young students learning multiple languages at once the freedom to experiment with mixing languages, as fluent bilingual speakers often do conversationally.

This talk was given at a TEDx event using the TED conference format but independently organized by a local community. Learn more at http://ted.com/tedx