I've been posting on writing with meaning. Most writing classes will insist that characters have to be round, that they have to grow through the story. And for the most part, that's true for the main characters of books for teens and adults. However, flat characters do have their place in literature. When you write a story, you need to decide which characters need to be flat with little to no growth and which need to be round.
Think through popular children's books, and you'll see they are often driven not by character growth but by adventure. Both Captain Underpants and Geronimo Stilton, some of the most popular books,. Kids love the humor, the excitement, and the color in these books. If the two kids of Captain Underpants learned to be good, emotionally mature boys, they wouldn't be funny, Kids would lose interest. If Geronimo Stilton changed, target audiences wouldn't know him. They want him to stay the same as he goes on his adventures.
Furthermore, a lot of background and side characters in books for older kids and adults similarly don't need to change. In Harry Potter, Dobby stays the same loyal character. Luna Lovegood may change some, but she stays true her nickname "Loony" no matter what happens around her. Hagrid never understands that his stubborn love of dangerous animals puts everyone around him in peril. If they ever stopped being themselves or became moving targets, you wouldn't be able to use them to measure the growth of the main characters. Part of their charm is they stay the same.
Even villains often stay the same, though not always. Voldemort doesn't learn as Harry Potter goes on adventure after adventure to face him and take him down. He holds that he is the only one to take down Harry, even though he's often the only one who can't. Malfoy gets taller but doesn't stop being the same bully he was as a first-year throughout most of the story. Side and antagonistic characters don't have to grow any more than kids' story characters do.
However, if your character or characters are at the center of a book for older kids or adults, he/she/they should grow. That's when you look at what kind of growth you want to explore. It doesn't have to be about the moral of the story, as in a conventional moral, like be a good child or obey your mama. Few people enjoy reading a book more about agenda than story, regardless of what your point is. However, think carefully. What kind of misunderstanding does your character start out with that he/she/they can grow out of?
For instance, in "Frozen," Elsa's misunderstanding is that she can protect the world, especially her sister, and find happiness through isolation. First, she tries isolating herself at home, then, when she leaves home, she finds a new place to hide. She even sings an anthem to isolation, "Let It Go," and banishes herself to an ice castle. Her isolation protects no one and brings her no joy. Anna starts with the misunderstanding that she needs a stranger to save her from the misery of her isolation. In the end, neither sister finds happiness until they both decide their true happiness is in each other. They grow and mature through overcoming their misunderstandings. They are the round characters, while Olaf, Duke Weselton, Hans, and the others remain more or less the same.
Part of the joy of crafting characters is to decide who needs to grow and who will need the same as the adventure and scenery around them change. How does your main character grow? What characters can remain flat?
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