Our current education system depends exclusively on standardization, accountability, and test scores, which often limits the learning within the classroom. This type of curriculum does not include children as contributors, their lived cultural experiences, or their voices and cultural diversity. The intent of this dissertation was to connect research to practice in my own early childhood classroom. This dissertation highlights the experiences of a teacher researcher as she used critical literacy practices as a framework to engage in conversations rooted in social justice with young children as well as to use children's funds of knowledge within the curriculum. This study was my attempt as an early child educator and researcher to use reflection and children's everyday conversations to create a critical literacy curriculum. This critical literacy curriculum consisted of four themes (family, diversity, gender roles, and kindness) as I used multicultural picture books to expand on children's funds of knowledge. I also created example critical literacy questions as a springboard to elicit discussion during read-alouds because I wanted to build on children's input, questions, and perspectives. During this time, children used their own Discourses to discuss social justice topics, which proved to be hegemonic and hetero-normative interpretations but slowly began to dismantle some of those views and referred to read-alouds. Throughout this study I used Gee's (2005) Discourse language tool of "building significance" to investigate, construct, and deconstruct the critical literacy practices within my pre-kindergarten classroom. This tool helped me to mindfully listen and observe classroom conversations in a new way using a critical lens. During this study, I reflected on my own experiences as a teacher and became more conscious of my practices, problematizing those practices. I also found that children were actively involved in the curriculum and proved themselves as qualified and able to "build significance," dismantle stereotypes, and discuss social justice topics. The classroom space provided opportunities for children's voices to be heard and for children to be contributors in their learning on social justice topics. [The dissertation citations contained here are published with the permission of ProQuest LLC. Further reproduction is prohibited without permission. Copies of dissertations may be obtained by Telephone (800) 1-800-521-0600. Web page: http://bibliotheek.ehb.be:2222/en-US/products/dissertations/individuals.shtml.]