Illustrated Story and Picture Book

Genre Study:

Illustrated stories and picture books are a literacy genre that provide a strong visual experience where the content of the story is fully explained or illustrated with pictures and may or may not include text. The overall theme of illustrated stories and picture books are generally more complex than the text that is presented because the purpose for this genre is to portray a meaningful moral or theme. In picture books, both text and illustration are fused together, to provide more than either can do alone, so the whole is greater than the sum of the parts in these texts. Illustrated story books are different from picture books in the sense that the text can stand alone and the illustrations are secondary to the text, yet they complements the text. Picture books and illustrated story books are generally up to 48 pages in length and they are used in the classroom to promote fluency because they can be read multiple times during one reading instructional period or several times in a short amount of time so the students can build fluency, accuracy, vocabulary skills, and comprehension. Picture books and illustrated stories are most often aimed at young children, and while some may have very basic language especially designed to help children develop their reading skills, most are written with vocabulary a child can understand but not necessarily read. For this reason, picture books tend to have two functions in the lives of children: they are first read to young children by adults, and then children read them themselves once they begin learning to read.

Symbaloo Webmix: http://www.symbaloo.com/home/mix/13eOcM97J5

Selected Titles:

George, J., & Small, D. (2000). So you want to be president?. New York: Philomel Books.

This text has a grade level equivalent of 4.2, meaning it is appropriate for fourth grade students in their second month of the year, and it has a Lexile level of 730L. Caldecott honor-winning artist David Small provides hilarious cartoons of the Presidents of the United States to keep readers engaged and interested in the content of the text. This text is a great tool for a classroom read-aloud because the voice of the text is conversational and it provides information in an engaging and funny manner. Students will also enjoy reading this text on their own because they will learn about the Presidents while looking at brilliantly drawn illustrations. This illustrated story is a great source for multi-disciplinary topics to connect to social studies and history. When observing the text complexity of So You Want to be President? the vocabulary, conventionality, sentence structure, life experiences, and cultural knowledge are very complex but the meaning and us of visual features are moderately complex.

Stein, D. E. (2010). Interrupting chicken. Somerville, Mass.: Candlewick Press.

Interrupting Chicken’s plot has a repetitive nature, with a humorous story line and a good underlying message for young children. The interest level of Interrupting Chicken is for kindergartners to 2^nd graders. The Lexile level is 300L and the grade level equivalent is for 2nd grade. Interrupting Chicken was awarded the 2011 Caldecott Honorable Mention Book Award because it is a distinguished American picture book for children. The book and story are engaging for young children because the illustrations keep the readers involved in the story and the students can easily interact and practice predicting what is going to happen in the story. This book is also a great resource for a classroom read-aloud because the reader can incorporate fun voices for the characters in the story to keep students engaged. This text can also be used to teach vocabulary and dialogue for students when they read and they can transfer what they learn about dialogue to their own writing.