When he looks at the pictures, he’ll get so excited he’ll want to draw one of his own. He’ll ask for paper and crayons.
~Laura Joffe Numeroff, illustrated by Felicia Bond. If You Give A Mouse a Cookie
Regarding how teachers teach reading, it’s alarming that pictures get a bad rap. One of the best ways to help children read is by reading them picture books they like starting when they’re young. Teachers should continue in every grade to let students explore books and discuss the stories they read and like. Picture books are critical to reading comprehension.
Children adore picture books and then move on to chapter books with fewer pictures, and soon, they are reading novels without pictures. When pictures are connected to teaching skills, it’s a win-win combination!
Sadly, and mainly due to politics, picture books are connected to Balanced Literacy, and pictures are being blamed for confusing students, like in this NBC segment about Mississippi’s reading progress, with its example claiming children will mistake sheep for a dog in the picture. The idea that pictures are somehow bad for children because they will rely on them is bizarre.
If you want to teach children how to read sheep, give them Sheep in a Jeep, a series by Nancy Shaw (See below). Children love these stories (there’s also one for Halloween). When they see pictures and words together, they will more easily connect sheep with sheep in stories they like.
As a long-time remedial reading teacher and a parent, I understand that reading to children and providing them with picture books aren’t all that children will need to be fluent readers, especially if a child is born with disabilities or in a household where they don’t have access to picture books.
But there is no reason why a class that teaches skills can’t include rich literature of a child’s liking. Providing children with many picture books to look at and explore print provides the critical foundation needed to be readers (see the many ways below).
We’ve known for years how important it is to read picture books to children. When children miss out on this, for whatever reason/s, they might take longer to learn to read. That’s why there has always been a push to get picture books into children’s hands early.
Exciting research shows that even reading to babies helps them with receptive and expressive language skills, both essential in learning to read (Towell et al., 2021).
While how teachers teach reading is being acrimoniously debated, parents, teachers, and caregivers of young children must continue to read picture books to children, inundate their world with rich print, and recognize how important this is to get their children off to a good start reading and to help them read better when they start school.
Reading to children with disabilities is especially important. They benefit just as much, if not more, by being read to and allowed to choose books they like to read with exciting pictures.
Here’s a list of some of what picture books teach.
- Attention. Some children are hyperactive but may focus on words and pictures in books they like. Unusually shaped books or books with flaps to find surprises, sensory stimulating books, or books with bright pictures and funny characters might pique a child’s interest in words and help them concentrate.
- Auditory Processing. Auditory processing difficulties make sounding letters difficult for some children. Picture book readers can adjust the speed at which they read and ask for verbal feedback to determine if the child understands what they hear and see.
- Auditory Discrimination. Connecting sounds and blends to a memorable story may make them more easily remembered than when isolated in a drill. Rhyme is especially important because children connect sounds and remember them more easily. It’s commonly recognized that children who have trouble with verse might need more help breaking up the words into sounds.
- Critical Thinking. Children connect ideas and information through discussions about the stories they hear and pictures they observe. Wordless picture books get children to discuss what they see or visually discriminate what’s happening in the story and are often used to help nonverbal students.
- Figure Ground. Children learn to find parts of the picture as opposed to the whole. I Spy and Where’s Waldo are good books for this, and the Highlights for Children Hidden Objects exercises. Reading to children and pointing out what’s in a picture and how each item is related to print is helpful.
- Fluency. When children practice reading picture books with words, they grow familiar with them; they’ll improve the speed at which they read. When adults reread picture books to children or read often, children learn the words being read. Usually, children get hooked on a book, which is normal and helpful because they learn through repetition. And nonreaders who pretend to read to siblings or friends are familiarizing themselves with words connected to pictures.
- Memory. Short- and long-term memory are essential to recall facts and pull the story’s meaning together. Students with good memory skills can recollect information faster than those with poor recall skills. Children with learning disabilities often have poor memory skills, so it’s essential to help them remember what’s read with pictures and words they like. Once a book is read to a child, they should have access to it so they can look at it independently. The words will look familiar, and they may connect them with pictures.
- Prediction. The more children read picture books; the easier it is for them to think about how the story will end.
- Sequencing. Children learn that there’s a beginning, a middle, and an end. Learning how to place ideas and thoughts in order is an important skill.
- Social Perception. When children learn about social issues, they develop understanding and empathy. An essential part of this involves helping them to examine facial expressions in the characters they see in pictures. It helps them to understand how to react to difficulties they face. Bibliotherapy involves assisting children to understand problems they may face with books that address their challenges.
- Spatial Relationship. How do items in the picture compare in size and shape? This would include perceptual constancy, where children distinguish shapes and objects and their position. In books like Clifford the Red Dog, they can discuss the oddities of having such a giant pup.
- Summarizing. Words with pictures help children pull together what a story is about. This ability to gather the parts of a story to make the whole is critical for reading for understanding.
- Syntax. Children see and hear how to string words together to make sentences.
- Verbal Skills. All students, including students with difficulty speaking, are encouraged to tell what they like about a story. Wordless picture books are also useful for generating speech. They can build the confidence of children with second languages and disabilities.
- Vocabulary. When children hear new words connected to pictures of those words, they combine both, and it helps them to learn new vocabulary. Many young readers can associate the image with the term and later remember the word alone. It’s why picture/word books like Richard Scarry’s Busytown, which include funny pictures of busy characters next to words that resonate with young readers. Teachers often present new vocabulary in the story before reading to help make it recognizable to the child.
References
Towell, B. L., Morrow, S., & Brown, S. L. (2021). Reading to babies: Exploring the beginnings of literacy. Journal of Early Childhood Literacy, 21(3), 321–337. https://doi.org/10.1177/1468798419846199
Lerner, J.W. (1971). Children with Learning Disabilities: Theories, Diagnosis, and Teaching Strategies. Boston: Houghton Mifflin Company.
I agree. That’s why most people like movies. I had a student who would not write, but loved to draw. In one of his intervention meetings the teachers said, “He will not write anything.” I had the student in art class. He drew a big picture with lots of superheroes. I said, “You know, I would really like to share your drawing with some people, but I don’t want to mess up talking about it. Can you write about your characters and all their super powers?” He didn’t hesitate to write one or two pages. From there, I found “Picturing Writing” was a “thing” and when students were “stuck” I told them to draw first from that image in their head, then write. It worked well. And like many people when it comes to books, we look at the cover picture (in fact Stephen King has a new book, “Holly” and the cover picture was mesmerizing).. The book with the dull cover could be the best read in the world, but most will go for the book with the cool picture. And, many of my students often told me, “Mr. Charvet, there are no pictures in this book. Too many words.” And if the typography is off, it creates “rivers and valleys” that many of our minds subconsciously internalize, hence, “my brain hurts, can I take a break.” I often told children, “There are great stories in the picture books. Pictures are worth a thousand words. I mean, “Can you read a painting?” Eric Carle had a video “Can You See a Song?” I know we can because I did at the Arts Institute in Chicago with our docent from the MOMA New York. In fact we all spent three hours looking at “pictures” and taking about them. When I was earning my teaching credential (and my son was just a toddler) he drew a picture (and because he could write at that time) I asked him about it. I wrote down his words. It was amazing how he described his friend Eric and the sun, the snake, and all the things happening. I used it as an example for my Reading Literacy course at the university. And most of all, like Eric Carle, the colors and images are simply amazing not just for kids, but for guys like me as well.
Thanks, Rick. It’s always interesting to hear about your experiences.
@Nancy, and by no means if I any expert, but pictures + words = comprehension and critical thinking has played out across all the grade levels I taught. As I was out in the yard watching the squirrels and bluejays (who finally figured out my “nut house’ I built) my mind kept thinking about how the district psychologist would always place students in my class because of the way I taught, my patience, and the use of art therapy. In fact, one student was place in my class due to they had “synoptical misfires” to the point of not being able to make pictures in their head. The psychologist thought by being in my art class and continuing to be surrounded by color, pictures, and whatnot might help develop more of the neurons so the student could eventually make pictures. I can attest to how pictures ignite fires in all ages! Sadly, there is no time for such silliness as drawing and painting and poetry and the joy of reading children’s books. Most of the time, I just had to go rogue and do what was best to help one mind at a time. Thanks for allowing me to share.
Thanks, Rick, for mentioning reading picture books across grade levels. I’ve known students who improved with comic books. But many picture books can be enjoyed by older students. I still head to that section at the bookstore and have quite a collection!
@Nancy, I used comics as well. In my later years when I taught Adult Ed, I would receive many students from China, Phillipines, Mexico, Paraguay, and El Salvador. My student from China was having a hard time comprehending the novels in his English class. Out of curiosity, I asked his process for reading without English being his primary language. He said first he read it as best he could in English; then in his brain translated it all to Chinese, and finally back to English. I told him, “Wow, your brain must be tired; that’s a lot of work.” He was trying to read MacBeth. Being the person I am I said, “Let me show you something.” I often used that phrase with my students and then realized I had always kept a Missouri license plate from my grandpa “Show Me State” — huh, something to my makeup. But, I went on to show my student a plethora of YouTube Videos that summarized the play. I also showed him “Schmoop” a great website with a variety of ways to comprehend school texts. MacBeth had a short video that I showed to him. I figured while his brain was going through a thousand steps at least he could get the gist of MacBeth. I answered some survey and Schmoop liked my answers so well, they made me a “Schmooper Star.” I just was myself and had fun writing. In sum, I too have a collection of comics (all the way back to 12 cents plus now a lot of graphic novels. So fun.
https://www.shmoop.com
Thank you for this reminder! Your list of the ways that picture books are good for kids is essential for educators to know.
As a kindergarten teacher, and parent, an amazed at the magical quality of great children’s literature. The classroom was almost never quiet, But certainly it was quietest when reading Chrysanthemum or A Fish Out of Water or ANY Elephant and Piggy book. Good children’s literature is captivating.
It’s so obvious that much time should be provided for read aloud’s in the classroom and that it should be highly encouraged at home. It’s scary that this article needs to be written. But as usual, in education, decision makers tend to jump on any new trend that is persuasively sold to them, and the tendency is to throw out the baby with the bathwater.
I find the current talk about pictures and teaching reading alarming implying pictures will hamper how children learn to read. Dull prescriptive decoding books might, especially if children don’t get to look at other more interesting books.
Hard to understand how wonderful picture books could ever be made out to be a bad guy in children’s reading education. It does seem as if the education world has lost the ability to pay attention to good instincts and experience in terms of what really works. Of course we need phonics! We always have. But sell a well packaged, cunningly sold, reading instruction program that promises to be the magic bullet and all instincts and experience as well as decades of research are out the window.
The kindergarten classroom is a very sad place right now. I hope that children’s book authors, and those of us who are in the classroom, as well as vocal professionals like you, Nancy, will rise up against this absurdity. The question is how to reach decision-makers which tend to be district superintendents.
As one of my colleagues recently said, because of the restrictions on time, and content, teachers in many schools have to “sneak in” good teaching. Imagine having to “sneak in” a good book to read to your students in kindergarten! What a mess. It hurts my heart.
Thank you, Phyllis. I try not to be negative, but it isn’t getting better. Kindergarten especially has been reinvented without much thought to child development.
Also, my granddaughter (two) loves the “I Spy” and “Where’s Waldo?” look and find books. I believe it trains children in taxonomy skills. I was in the store looking for potpourri and thought, “Hmmm…not next to the silk flower in the art section, where might I find it?” I ran it through my brain and thought “candles section”. And for a great book (if I my own boys hadn’t picked these books out at the library I would have never known about them) “Reflections” by Ann Jonas. Great picture books teaching children “how to see”. I later used her concepts in my art class. Great learning all around.
Interesting! Thanks. I will check it out.
Thank you for this post, Nancy. The national conversation is again focused on phonics. Decoding is only part of a reader’s foundation for making meaning. Word calling is not enough. Comprehension counts!
P.S. I think it is especially odd to criticize young readers’ use of illustrations to help them make sense of texts. We live in a hyper-visual media world. Much of our own (adult) reading is image based. Why would we deprive young readers of all the tools in their toolbox? As your post specifies there’s so more to picturebooks than pictures!
Some will argue that they do indeed read picture books, but I often see such concerns, like the NBC segment shows, of students misreading pictures. Usually, they are decoding texts. And indeed, teachers don’t leave children to look at picture books all day doing nothing else.
In my 17 years of teaching art I taught many students with a variety of learning disabilities. Anecdotally I saw numerous students improve not only with their rendering, but also through their communications as I had them draw from observation. I often had discussions with Special Ed. teachers about the possibility of conducting a class in high school specifically to determine impacts of observation and rendering practices on learning. I’m afraid that we were not able to do this due to my move to administration. I have been reflecting on what we actually mean by the phrase Artificial intelligence. Such a definition for acquiring intellectual acuity ignores many of sensory practices you list in this article that are necessary for the motivation to read and learn. An over focus on decoding, phonemic awareness, and reading fluency discounts the visual and auditory contributions necessary for learning. Besides, the aesthetic quality of a picture book makes stories fun. A serious mistake prevalent in this age of technology is that input equals output when teaching. Our brain is far too complicated to assume information is automatically retained when given through the printed word.
This is bonkers. The fact that commenters feel a need to defend picture books is flat out crazy.
The very dubious claim that the pictures might detract from decoding ignores the delight and wonderment that those pictures create along with the bond created between books and some truly amazing art. Just imagine, “Where the Wild Things Are”, without.
I agree, Rick. Thank you. It’s always interesting how I’m told no one dislikes picture books; then there’s concern that pictures will lead children to the wrong words. Picture books are so connected to balanced literacy.
This discussion presents a structured choice, a classic approach to framing a debate in a way that limits options:
A) Endorse the value of picture books and risk bolstering methods like balanced literacy and whole language.
B) Question picture books and risk being labeled as extreme.
The goal of identifying this kind of restricted framing is not to attack any individual or group. Instead, it seeks to create space for a more open, informed discussion.
By pinpointing the tactic employed, we can better understand the landscape of this debate and make more informed contributions.
I don’t see those who advocate the SoR talking about the kinds of great stories that exist that children will like. They’ll tell me that it is taken for granted, but I also know parents who, due to the negativity surrounding 3 cueing, worry about a child’s reliance on pictures and not words.
SoR has had an effect on the way many view picture books.
It seems you’re suggesting that the Science of Reading advocates want to remove picture books. This framing presents a false dilemma, which can lead to unproductive debates based on misleading premises. Let’s focus on the genuine concerns rather than being swayed by artificial constructs.
The SoR advocates have criticized 3-cueing and the idea that children can look at pictures and words and learn those words by guessing what the pictures are. They say children won’t recognize the words once the pictures are removed.
I say that’s wrong. While children need much more to learn to read, there is nothing wrong with looking at pictures and words. Many children learn many words this way.
This can be used with a well-rounded literacy program.
By reading picture books to children, there are many learned skills, as I point out. And children should be allowed to look at picture books they like.
I’ve been told picture books are lovely but don’t teach skills. I absolutely disagree.
So, this is far from being an artificial construct.
Critiques of specific teaching strategies like 3-cueing should not be confused with a general opposition to picture books. We must be precise in our discussions to ensure a productive conversation about best practices in teaching reading.
They’re connected. I repeatedly see the examples I just described. The idea that guessing is bad. Many children guess right. I’m not saying children should be given a book and told to go read it alone. Or be left to ONLY guess at words. Of course not. But there are many ways to help children learn to read.
@Nancy –When I was at Santa Clara University for The California Arts Project (TCAP) institute each of us had to work in two of our artistic disciplines and teach all the other instructors. One person was from Egypt. Our task was to teach a skill through pictures only. She told us the children had limited resources so we were to work with cuttings from cereal boxes. We made tiny “instruction skills” booklets where we taught someone how to do something. I created a way to make burritos using PICTURES. Think of how many instructional booklets use the universal language of pictures to teach skills like putting together a cabinet for, well, making a burrito. There is no “one way” and it always bothered me that teachers are sold the best new thing which meant throw out other things. It happened when whole language was the “new thing” as we were told to get rid of any of our phonics books. Other great system that went out with the tide was “Slingerland” where children used pictures and the touch to decode. Education should be organic where we keep what works, learn from the old, and move forward to best education our youth. Some of the best things I have I inherited from my grandpa because they were built well and work better than any of the new things built today. Thanks for letting me share.
Thank you for sharing your lovely artistic ideas, Rick. I have always loved picture books without words, because children can make their own inferences, which you mentioned before.
@Nancy — and as the discussion continues, I thought how inferences come into play. Geez, I thought there was only one kind, but it is a question that continues to pop up through out grade levels. By “LOOKING and SEEING” what does the child think is happening in the picture? I know I asked those questions to my kids before they could read. The thing is there are great strategies but, as always, how does one make the connections to move the child along in their learning? What strategy works for “one mind at a time?” Just a thought. Blessings to all.
Oh absolutely! Thanks for mentioning this. Making inferences in what a child sees is very important! Thanks, Rick!