[artist id="3079282"]Selena Gomez[/artist] has just been cast to play Beezus in the film adaptation of "Ramona and Beezus," the first book in Beverly Cleary's popular "Ramona" children's series. Gomez will be joined by up-and-coming child actress Joey King, who is set to play Beezus' little sister, the rambunctious and accident-prone Ramona, reports Reuters.

Elizabeth Allen, who previously directed "Aquamarine," will direct this flick about the two sisters. The movie is set for release on March 19, 2010, but it hasn't yet been announced when Gomez, who currently stars in Disney's "The Wizards of Waverly Place," and 9-year-old King will start working on the film.

[article id="1604325"]Gomez also plans on releasing an album[/article] this year. In a recent blog post about her music, she wrote, "Also I'm still in the studio recording my album. And I really am so happy with how it's coming out and can't wait to share it with you guys!"

Gomez's busy schedule also includes making a [article id="1598305"]"Wizards of Waverly Place" TV-movie[/article]. "The show is going great. We are almost finished with our second season," she blogged. "[I'm] about to take off to shoot our movie for the show! We are so excited to start that!"

Back in October, Gomez spoke to MTV News about the "Wizards" movie, revealing that "We actually want to shoot it here in New York," and even speculated a bit about what might happen in the film. "I think it would have to be that our secret is about to be exposed."