Locke and Children's Literature

Who would have thought that children's literature was designed as an educational tool?  That it was intended as a means of creating well rounded, God fearing, polite, and well mannered children; with the hope of them becoming functioning adults?  Children's literature was actually developed in response to the need of an educational system.  This explains why fairy tales contain life lessons and morals.  John Locke was one of the main people who founded children's education and literature.  He used common sense when writing for children, his goal was to not only make them literate, but to also teach them to succeed and be better people.  It seemed that every children's book reinforced the ten commandments, even the alphabet books.  Early children's books were some what intense and focused on the ABC's and rhyming.  This promoted literacy, developed sentence structure, and interestingly forwarded the Puritan movement.  Some of the early works were The House that Jack Built and The Burial of Cock Robin.  I remember reading these myself as a child and even discussing The House that Jack Built in my syntax class over the summer.  The early forms of lesson books were known as horn-books and battledore.  Chapbooks were small cheap books that preserved fairy tales and were popular because of their price.  The book Orbis Sensualium Pictus (1659) reminded me of an early college textbook.  This book was suppose to be for small children and teach them how to read.  What I found interesting was that when a student learned to read they didn't have to attend school anymore.  Although this is probably redundant, if pupils stayed in school till, say 8 years old, and became literate; does that mean at 8 years old that child was considered an adult?  What I found most interesting about the chapters in Lerer was that Winnie the Pooh and Where the Wild Things Are were based off of Robinson Crusue, I had never known that.