5 Picture Books that Speak Countless Words . . . and Sharpen Children's Intellects

The marriage between the images and the text in a well wrought picture book is just like any loving relationship — the words of Rilke, they should be “as two solitudes that protect and border and greet each other”, narrative and illustrious in their own right, playing off of one another, each letting the other carry something of their shared story.

Goodall's Nancy is a picture book
without words.  Even the youngest
of readers can map the story of young
Nancy's outlandish behavior
on her sister's wedding day.

Children know this instinctively.  They love to ‘discover’ the story which is not told, but revealed in the pictures — the little micro-dramas unraveling through the pages like whispers.  Books like John Goodall’s Naughty Nancy, Jan Brett’s The Mitten, Martin Hanford’s Where’s Waldo series, Sibylle Von Olfers’ Mother Earth and Her Children or Gyo Fujikawa’s Oh What a Busy Day enable children at various reading stages to enter the world of the story on their own terms . . . to make choices of interpretation, to delight in the unsaid ‘clues’ depicted there . . . in other words, to sharpen the quill of their inner Shakespeare, to hone their inner Holmes.

The images within these stories cultivate children’s skills in conducting independent observation and interpretation, wonder and inquiry.   In a world fraught with multitasking and distractions, such skills have never been more precious, or at risk for being lost altogether.

When Miss S was a toddler, we would read The Mitten aloud and I would direct her attention toward the borders of Brett’s beautiful illustrations, which forecasted each event to come by illustrating it. 

“What animal finds the mitten next? “ I would ask, and with a glance at the illustrations she would rightly answer, “The fox!  The mouse!  The bear!” and so forth.  Sure enough, when we turned the page, the animal had appeared on the scene.   

She had not only been reminded of the names of these animals, but she was as proud as a peacock to have forecasted what was coming based on her own observational skills. 

Breckling Press’s version of Von Olfers’ Mother Earth and Her Children is another fantastic tool to hone young readers’ observational skills in the process of reading a lovely story.  Illustrated by master quilter Sieglinde Schoen Smith, the glorious pictures depict a cosmos of small creatures at work and at play — ladybugs and butterflies, larkspur and forget-me-nots, beetles and earthly cherubs. 

Within the book there are fantastic ‘treasure hunt’ prompts that parents can use to encourage children to look more closely: 

If there is a fault with the design of this book, it is that these great questions are printed on the back of the dust cover rather than within the book proper . . . and therefore, are more likely to be damaged or lost as the book is handled.  That being said, this book not only entertains, but beautifully invites three to four year old readers to think categorically, analyze the illustrations for content, and to use them in order to hypothesize character motivation. 

                                                                                                                       

Within Gyo Fujikawa’s Oh What a Busy Day — which remains to this day my most beloved picture book from my own childhood — Miss S. has spent hours of her life reading the events that are unraveling across the glorious page spreads—deciding for herself which of the children at the playground are having the most fun, or which foods she would eat for breakfast were she at the kitchen table full of children that Fujikawa illustrates early in the book.  

The gloriously detailed images in Oh What a Busy Day can draw 4-5 year old readers into a state of ‘parallel narration’—where they observe the characters at work and play in the illustrations, and find themselves invited to deliberate on the characters as representing choices —going sledding or skating, being generous or selfish, going camping or on a picnic. 

Generations of children who have swam through the illustrations in this book have encountered choices upon choices upon choices laid before them . . . and as they mulled over and through them, they have been afforded opportunities to see themselves as possessing choice as well — in what they choose to do, in how they choose to behave, in what they choose to want today, tomorrow, and 18 years down the road. 

A most valuable skill to hone, actually. . .  whether one is four or forty!

. . . and of course, Where’sWaldo is a mainstay of every seven to ten year old’s reading repertoire because of Hansford’s exquisite illustrations, which are not merely designed to obscure Waldo, but to weave an intricate number of stories, subplots, and dramas which are just waiting to be unveiled by the young reader’s eye.  Waldo is for advanced elementary readers in so much as many of the illustrations derive their humor from situational wordplay . . . a coffee presenting a cake. . . a flower taking the long road toward the glory of cakedom.   Miss S. giggles for hours on end with the Waldo books as each new secret is revealed, each new word play deciphered.

Wonder is but a light skiff and inquiry its billowing sail.  Any meaningful education requires both parts of this trusty rig –wonder making inquiry buoyant, inquiry moving wonder across the waters of the unknown.

Through these five picture books, even young readers are able to begin charting the waters successfully.