An illustrated book is often a child’s first introduction to the magical world of reading. Children have short attention spans and a limited vocabulary, thus the pictures represent a relatively familiar concrete experience with which they can identify. Books like Eight Ways to Draw an Elephant and Tree Matters with their bright colours, simple pictures and sparse texts encourage a child to engage imaginatively with the objects and events portrayed. The illustrations play a significant role in attracting a child to words as they provide a pictorial restatement of the text and also expand its meanings. The child responds to line, colour and shape as he or she looks at the beautiful pictures and the minimal textual content forces him or her to interpret and recreate a mental picture of the story being narrated.
November 2015, volume 39, No 11