Lindsay Lander

Assignment 7
MEDT 7490
Fall 2016

Exploring Visual Literacy Through Picture Books

As a media specialist, I use picture books in my instruction almost daily. Students

of all ages love to study the pictures and make connections to them. I notice a big
difference when reading a picture book versus a chapter book. With a picture book,
students are more engaged and really listening to what I am reading. Visual literacy is so
important to teach children how to read pictures as well as process and understand them.
The studies in the following articles all prove that, as long as we have the correct
knowledge and tools to teach the importance of visual literacy, children respond well, to
and benefit from, the images in a picture book.
In the article entitled, Picture Partners: A Co-Creative Journey into Visual
Literacy by Cathleen S. Soundy and Marilyn F. Drucker, the authors write about an early
literacy project called Picture Partners. The project studies how children express
meaning through creativity and art. The article also investigates how children use
illustrations from picture books to help inspire their own creations as well as
collaborating with their peers. The article includes drawings and writings of the children
involved in the study. They were made in response to group read-alouds and discussions

with peers. Their interactions, experiences and cultures are all considered when
reviewing their work and how they are influenced.
Childrens artwork has been heavily analyzed throughout history. Different
studies have been conducted to determine how moods and emotions have influenced
childrens drawings. The authors include multiple examples about relevant research
including Golombs 2002 study that finds that art development branches out in different
directions, depending on individual factors, the purpose of drawing, and the cultural
milieu (p. 448). They also report that children create meaning through writing, music
and other expressions of art. Soundy and Drucker (2010) also discuss the field of
semiotics, which is the study of all systems of signs, symbols and how these are used to
communicate (p. 448). In semiotic theory, children create meaning from the symbols
and signs in illustrations in picture books but are influenced by their peers, creating an
entirely new learning environment and process.
For this project, two teachers hand selected kindergarten and first grade
classrooms as the sites for their six-week study. Two picture books were used for the
project: The Snowy Day (Keats 1962) and Snowmen at Night (Buehner 2002). Students
(or as they are called in the article, pre-service teachers) worked with groups of two or
three children (designated as picture partners). An instructional intervention was
implemented where the pre-service teachers read the books to their groups without
stopping to ask questions or discuss the book. When they were finished, the children
were asked to answer a few questions and share their responses with their partner. Then
they were asked to draw a scene from the book (completely recalled from memory).
After the drawings were collected, they responded to another prompt by writing about

their picture. The pre-service teachers observed and took field notes on behaviors. A third
prompt was given in which the children were asked to orally respond to a question about
their picture. Responses were recorded. Finally, the pre-service teachers were asked to
reflect upon their experiences in a journal. After collecting all the data, Soundy and
Drucker used a qualitative and interpretive approach. 105 drawings were produced by
the children and analyzed by the authors. The pre-service teachers were able to examine
the childrens literary understandings by analyzing their drawings, as well as their written
and oral responses.
The authors concluded that their research could have benefitted from looking at
childrens artwork over time using various picture books, not just focusing on one
instance using one picture book. Soundy and Drucker (2010) found that children are
definitely influenced by their peers and can function as sounding boards for one
another (p. 458). They found that teachers have the opportunity to glimpse into the
sociocultural world of their students by studying and analyzing their artwork. They can
use these drawings to create a deeper understanding of how a student explores meaning.
I think the authors did a good job in collecting solid, qualitative data. However, I
do agree that more picture books should have been used, as well as including a wider
variety of ages that participated in the study. I learned about semiotics, the study of signs
and symbols, and how important it is when it comes to visual literacy. People use
semiotics to communicate and process information. Picture books are a valuable tool in
teaching children how to interpret the signs and symbols that they may encounter outside
of school and in their every day lives.

In the article, Picture This: Visual Literacy as a Pathway to Character

Understanding, authors Lori Ann Prior, Angelli Wilson and Miriam Martinez discuss the
integral role of characters in a readers meaning-making process. They study how
children use pictorial information in order to create a deeper understanding of the
characters in a book and make suggestions on how teachers can help students interpret
this information.
Research has shown that even if we forget the picture books of our childhood,
many people still recall memorable characters because of the impression they make on
them as they read. In their literature review, they state that discussing characters can help
children point out the central theme of a story. Readers gain information differently
about characters in picture books than they do in chapter books. Picture books are told
through a mix of pictures and text so readers must pay attention to both the visual and
verbal aspect of the story.
The study took place in a South Texas second grade classroom and was done to
explore the kinds of pictorial information that young children use to delve deeper into the
characters of a picture book. The elementary school consists of 49% white and 49%
Hispanic students. The classroom had 4 boys and 8 girls. Three picture books were used
in the study: When Sophie Gets Angry Really, Really Angry by Molly Bang (1999),
Leonardo the Terrible Monster by Mo Willems (2005) and Lillys Purple Plastic Purse by
Kevin Henkes (1996). The children were shown one illustration from each book. They
were asked to talk about the illustration and discuss what was used in each picture that
gives information about the characters. Over three weeks, the authors of the study visited
the classroom once a week. They observed the teacher during the read aloud and spoke

with the students about the story. The students were often asked to make predictions
about the story as well as recall information and make connections to their own
experiences. During the observations, the authors recorded the discussions and took
notes. Finally, they interviewed each student after each book was read aloud. During
these interviews, the students were shown the selected illustrations and asked questions
about them. It was found that even though the children werent specifically asked about
characters, they all chose to focus on this element and make inferences on characters.
Specifically, they noticed character expression, body postures and actions. The authors
learned that children use visual information to better understand the characters in a
picture book. They also found that children did not notice certain visual cues in the
illustrations suggesting that teachers have a lot of work to do when it comes to teaching
and encouraging visual literacy.
The research presented was well documented and the methods were good.
However, I would suggest expanding the participants by selecting more than one
classroom within the school. Furthermore, it would also be interesting to see this study
done in various states and or done with different socioeconomic populations.
This is an important article for media specialists because we constantly use
picture books in lessons. Its easy to ask students to make predictions and discuss a
picture, but I never thought to take time to study the illustrations myself, before I share
the book with students. I need to look at the illustrations and understand how meaning
about characters is conveyed throughout the artwork. If Im focusing on a lesson about
characterization, its important to select a book that highlights this element. That way, I
can walk students through the book and help foster critical visual literacy skills.

The final article I reviewed is entitled Inside the Picture, Outside the Frame:
semiotics and the reading of wordless picture books by Patricia Crawford and Daniel
Hade. Wordless picture books are a becoming more and more popular. Not only are they
beautiful to read, but they also lend themselves well to critical thinking as well as a
multitude of creative writing lessons. In the literature review, its mentioned that, the
reading of wordless picture books is an open-ended process in which viewers read stories
by bringing their background experiences and personal histories to bear on the visual
images they encounter within the text (Crawford and Dade, 2000). The lack of a
written narrative helps students analyze and think about the story in a unique way. The
authors mention several studies that involve children reading wordless books and
analyzing different elements such as storytelling, narratives and story construction. All in
all, these studies conclude that children do benefit from working with wordless text,
especially when it comes to comprehension.
In their study, the researchers asked three children that were very familiar with
books to participate. The children were 8, 5 and 4 and consisted of 1 girl and 2 boys.
The two older participants attended a private school while the youngest participant did
not yet attend school. A convenience sample was utilized, instead of a random selection.
The researchers collected data by conducting individual sessions in the childrens homes.
Each session was 90 minutes long and a total of 12 wordless picture books were used.
The children looked at the books and chose one to read aloud. Once finished reading,
they shared their thoughts on the book. This process was repeated two times resulting in
each child read and analyzed three wordless picture books. The sessions were recorded
using a video camera. Transcripts were made from the recordings that included

observations from the researchers. Furthermore, The data were then analyzed
according to the principles of qualitative content analysis, which
involves a systematic review of the data, coding, category
construction, and analysis (Crawford and Hade, 2000).
The researchers found that the children chose books that they
wanted to read based on a certain visual element or illustration. They
noticed that one child did not pick a certain book because he thought it
was too girly. Additionally, one child picked a certain book because it
was long, like a chapter book. Even though this choice wasnt based
on an illustration, it was still based on a visual cue. The fact that the
book was long made her think it was for older kids, like herself. The
study concluded that children looked at the wordless picture books and
analyzed them in very similar ways in which they would read a book
with printed text. The children were able to construct meaning of
these books by using prior knowledge and past experiences with books
and reading. They were able to use the story structures of books that
they had already read, or been exposed to, and apply that knowledge
in order to craft their own story for the wordless books.
As with the other studies, a larger sample of children could have
benefitted this study. The authors could have used a wider variety of
ages and socioeconomic status. They used a convenience sample,
where Im assuming they might have known the children. To me, a
random sample seems to be more appropriate for a research study.

Reading is such a personal experience. I always find myself

really enjoying a book where I can closely relate to the experiences of
a character. Being able to connect children with books that they can
relate to is an important task. Its a task that is not easily done, even
with access to hundreds of books. Finding a good fit for a student
requires skill, knowledge and perseverance. But once its done, a life
long reader is born.
This assignment was challenging. I was able to find a lot of
literature about visual literacy and picture books, but I had a difficult
time finding actual research studies done on the topic. I found the
topic interesting because picture books are a huge part of my job. I
have a deeper understanding of how students make meaning out of
pictures, as well as how they analyze important visual cues. I work
with older elementary-aged students (grades 3rd 5th) and I always try
to incorporate picture books into my lessons. We read them,
summarize them and even act them out. This assignment, as well as
this class, has really helped me see the value in using picture books to
foster visual literacy skills.

References
Crawford, P. A., & Hade, D. D. (2000). Inside the picture, outside the
frame: semiotics and the reading of wordless picture books. Journal Of
Research In Childhood Education, 15(1), 66-80.

Prior, L. A., Willson, A., & Martinez, M. (2012). PICTURE THIS: Visual
Literacy as a Pathway to Character Understanding. The Reading
Teacher, (3). 195.

Soundy, C., & Drucker, M. (2010). Picture Partners: A Co-creative

Journey into Visual Literacy. Early Childhood Education Journal, 37(6),
447-460.