How can Picture Books be used in Primary Education?

‘Engagement with picture books while we are young forms the basis for becoming a literature adult, one who not only decodes words accurately but also enjoys reading and takes the time to read. Teachers who share quality picture books with young children are promoting literacy in the fullest sense of the word. For this reason, exemplary early childhood educators have always made high quality children’s picture books a central part of their curriculum’ (Jalongo, 2004, p.1).

I feel this quote is great in describing the benefits of the use of picture books in primary education. In my previous blog I spoke about the benefits of storytelling within primary education and I believe picture books take that one step further.  Storytelling has been recognised to be an effective learning tool in classrooms and picture books are just as beneficial.

Picture books allow children to practice the sounds of language and the rhyme and rhythm used within picture books make them excellent to read aloud and they allow children to learn words more easily. Repetition is often a common theme in picture books and this makes it easy for children to participate in the story as they can predict upcoming lines. This also promotes development of skills such as fluency, comprehension and phonics (The Children’s Book Review, 2010). Another benefit of picture books is the combination of words and image. This multiplicity increases the interaction needed from the reader and it allows for more active and involved reading (Pantaleo, 2004). This active interaction with the book stimulates mind growth and their imagination (The Children’s Book Review, 2010).

Furthermore, wordless picture books are also very effective within primary education. Wordless picture books are often overlooked however they do offer a valuable opportunity to develop literacy competencies such as writing, reading, listening and speaking skills (Swan, 1992). They can be used in a class room to encourage children to write descriptive sentences to accompany the picture book. This in turn develops their sense of story as well as encouraging them to use higher level thinking skills. Writing the story to match the pictures also allows them to personalise the story making it more meaningful (Reese, 1996). Being in control of the story writing and being able to use their own thoughts and feelings may promote interest in story writing/telling and further develop literacy skills as their interests grow.

Finally, another benefit of picture books is the ability to carry out ‘Philosophy for Children’ (known as P4C) sessions. P4C sessions start with a stimulus –picture books are very effective, and then children are encouraged to use their imagination to ask questions relating to what they have seen or read. A discussion begins but is not contained to elements seen/read in the book. The discussion is free to follow its own path which is guided by the children’s thought and feelings. P4C is effective as it teaches children to think before they speak and to always give reasons for their ideas. They are taught to respect the opinions of others and to not be fearful in expressing themselves. It also allows intelligence to grow and gives both ‘academic’ and ‘non-academic’ children the chance to flourish and think outside the box.  Philosophy for Children has an impact on many areas of the curriculum besides literacy skills. It creates an enquiring classroom in all subject areas, it affects their personal skills and behaviour as well as giving children the feeling of independence (Lenton and Vidion, 2016).

(The photo above is an image of myself and a group of people carrying out a P4C session using the book ‘Bear Goes to Town’ by Anthony Browne, which is also shown pictured higher up in this blog)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x5wuHRyHez0 – watch first 4 mins. This is a link to a video that gives a good insight of the benefit of picture books.

References

Jalongo, M.R. (2004) Young Children and Picture Books. 2^nd edn. Washington, DC : National Association for the Education of Young Children.

Lenton, D and Vidion, B. (2016) Philosophy4Children. Available at: http://www.philosophy4children.co.uk/home/p4c/ (Accessed: 17^th February 2018).

Pantaleo, S. (2004) ‘Young Children and Radical Change Characteristics’, Reading Teacher, 58(2), pp.178-187.

Reese, C. (1996) ‘Story Development Using Wordless Picture Books’, Reading Teacher, 50(2), pp.172.

Swan, A.M. (1992) ‘Wordless Picture Book Buddies (In the Classroom)’, Reading Teacher, 48(8), pp.655.

The Children’s Book Review. (2010) How Picture Books Play a Role in a Child’s Development. Available at: https://www.thechildrensbookreview.com/weblog/2010/11/how-picture-books-play-a-role-in-a-child%E2%80%99s-development.html (Accessed: 17^th February 2018).