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Picturebooks have been used in multiple English language learning contexts (EFL, ESL, EAL, CLIL, Bilingual and the language(s) of schooling) for several decades dating back to at least the 1970s as storytelling (or the reading aloud of a picturebook in the classroom) is one of the most natural and effective ways of introducing learners to continuous and coherent spoken discourse as well as supporting literacy development. In addition to linguistic gains there are other gains. Ellis and Brewster (2014:7) refer to cross-curricular goals, learning to learn, conceptual reinforcement and citizenship, diversity and multicultural gains. More recently, there has been a move to developing intercultural competence through picturebooks (ICEPELL 2022).
Picturebooks can be interpreted on many levels as they meet the needs and interests of learners of different ages and at different stages in their English language learning and so provide a flexible resource. They are widely used with pre-primary and primary aged children and to a lesser extent with secondary aged learners and adult learners. However, the pedagogical value of picturebooks is becoming increasingly recognised in secondary ELT (Alter and Merse 2023), especially picturebooks with a thematic focus on topics such as social justice, mental health awareness, racism, inclusion, and global issues. Various studies also illustrate the role of the picturebook as a teaching resource in tertiary education for the development of students’ English language proficiency. Finally, the picturebook as a learning-to-teach tool when educating future teachers of English, is essential to support the teaching of effective picturebook-based classes. Regrettably, despite the learning gains picturebooks can bring into the classroom and the importance given to children’s literature in publications on English language education, picturebooks are an underutilised resource. Global, as well as European, uptake and embedding of the picturebook in English language learning, is generally patchy with only small pockets of enthusiastic usage, usually advocated by passionate individuals. This is because there continues to be a lack of teacher education to raise awareness of the potential of the picturebook as a valid resource for English language learning and how to exploit it for language and literacy learning, as well as for wider educational goals. This is why we have created the Words & Pictures Online Library. For further information on the history of picturebooks in ELT see: Editorial: The Journey by Sandie Mourão and Janice Bland, CLELEjournal, Volume 4, Issue 2, 2016Read More
Early language learning in formal educational contexts has been growing rapidly worldwide since the early 1980s. The introduction was cautious often starting with the last two years of primary school, i.e. children around the age of 9 and 10. For the majority of teachers this represented a new venture and a new experience. There were feelings of both excitement and apprehension and the common questions were: ‘What are the most appropriate teaching approaches and what are the most appropriate teaching and learning materials and resources?’ This era also coincided with the growth of Communicative Language Teaching and a focus on the use of authentic texts for authentic language use. As picturebooks bring authenticity to the learning experience, as the words are not carefully controlled, graded and sequenced, they were seen as an ideal resource to provide a natural, motivating and meaningful context for language use by exposing children to rich, authentic language. ght bring into a language classroom.
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During the 1960s, 1970s and 1980s there was a shift towards more holistic approaches to reading development in the teaching of the language(s) of schooling. This led to the creation of the term ‘real books’ to differentiate picturebooks from reading schemes where language is carefully controlled, graded and sequenced. With the growth of early language learning, the acknowledgement of the potential of picturebooks as an appealing resource was seen to offer a refreshing alternative to the bland and mundane content often found in reading schemes or mainstream coursebooks. Picturebooks have also been referred to as ‘storybooks’ (Ellis and Brewster , 1991, 2002, 2014, Ghosn, 2013) but there has been a gradual move to the use of the term, ‘picturebook’ (written as a compound noun), which reflects its authentic, multimodal nature where both words and pictures together create meaning. It is this fusion of the best in trade publishing from the world of children’s literature and effective age-appropriate picturebook-based ELT pedagogy which offers a high quality, flexible and motivating approach to language teaching and learning. It fosters language development in an enjoyable, visual, literary and cultural context and brings multimodal representation into the classroom.
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In 1997, Opal Dunn self-published REALBOOK News, a twice-a-year newsletter, to promote the use of picturebooks in ELT more widely. Following its success, the Learning English through Picture Books International Conference was held at the International Youth Library, Munich, Germany, in November 2004. The conference brought together teachers, trainers, researchers, publishers, and picturebook creators and was attended by 180 enthusiasts from 21 countries. It was supported by REALBOOK News, IATEFL, Munich University, London Metropolitan University and the British Council who showcased The Magic Pencil – an exhibition celebrating the best of British children’s book illustrators. As a result, an edited volume by Enever & Schmid-Schönbein ‘Picture Books and Young Learners of English’, published in 2006, became the first conference publication devoted to picturebooks.
Both the conference and the conference proceedings provided researchers and practitioners with a theoretical background for further researching and including picturebooks in the ELT classroom. Opal Dunn’s lifelong work in promoting the use of picturebooks in English language learning was recognised when she was awarded the British Council’s ELTons 2020 Award for Outstanding Achievement (see Special Congratulatory Feature) and to read more about Opal Dunn’s career see ‘Using Picture Books – Fifty Pioneering Years’.
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In 2010, Sandie Mourão launched her blog, Picturebooks in ELT which was winner of the Best English Blog Awards in 2013. Her aim was to discuss and share picturebooks with a particular emphasis on the visual as opposed to the verbal aspects as in language learning contexts there is a tendency to focus more on the words. She sought to help teachers appreciate the relevance of understanding the picturebook, its multimodality and the associated metalanguage used to talk about the different parts of a picturebook in the classroom, the peritextual features. Also at this time, articles on using picturebooks in English language learning were beginning to discuss the picturebook through a more academic lens and children’s literature scholarship was beginning to be referenced in publications with a focus on picturebooks in language education, (Bland 2013).
In 2013 the Children’s Literature in English Language Education CLELEjournal, a bi-annual, peer-reviewed open access online journal, was launched for scholars, teacher educators and practitioners involved in using and researching children’s literature in the field of English learning as a second, additional or foreign language. The journal investigates children’s literature as an art form, and as a framework with which to connect L2 literature teaching across the school years. The scope covers the affordances of children’s literature for L2 acquisition, intercultural learning and global issues education with pre-school children through to young adults. The CLELEjournal Editorial Report for its 10th anniversary showed that the picturebook was very popular amongst trends in literary formats.
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From 2018 – 2023 Picturebooks in European Primary English Language Teaching (PEPELT), a social media project on Facebook with a companion website, promoted the use of picturebooks in primary English language education. It aimed to help teachers critically explore, select and use picturebooks which enable children to address global issues and promote positive change inside and outside the classroom, as well as to empower teachers to go beyond language teaching alone and embrace their wider professional remit. Each co-founder presented a picturebook from a different perspective focussing on peritextual features, multiliteracies, teacher education, and practical ideas for the classroom. PEPELT was a finalist in the British Council’s 2020 ELTons awards for Innovation in Teacher Resources.
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In the 80s and 90s teachers were mainly using a traditional, conventional canon of picturebooks such as Brown Bear, Brown Bear, What do you See?, The Very Hungry Caterpillar or the Meg and Mog series. In fact, The Very Hungry Caterpillar was being so widely used that Shelagh Rixon described it ‘as in danger of becoming an international superstar on the EFL front’ in her 1992 State of the Art article in Language Teaching. These titles conform to our construct of childhood (although this will vary across time and across cultures) and what we think is suitable and appropriate for children in terms of stylistic suitability of the visual language and suitability of the subject matter. These picturebooks are happy, amusing, ‘nice and cute’, safe, harmless stories. In addition, the main focus at this time when using picturebooks in ELT, was to teach and learn language so picturebooks were often selected for their potential to complement the themes, vocabulary and phrases typical of English language learning syllabuses for children such as clothes, colours, food, the weather, rooms in a house, animals etc and many often included patterned language with repetitions or rhymes.
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While these titles still remain firm favourites, and while there has been a long tradition in Nordic countries to address the less cosy aspects of life in picturebooks, there has been a gradual shift over the decades in Europe and elsewhere to using picturebooks which address more realistic, problem-oriented topics. These picturebooks show the true complexity of the world we live in and allow learners to think and talk about issues which are important and relevant to them. This shift is partly due to children’s increased exposure to political, social and environmental issues via education, TV and social media, as well as their increased exposure to multimodal texts and recognition of their ability to embrace a range of artistic approaches and respond to complex texts. Examples of projects which have pioneered the use picturebooks which contain real life subject matter and where learners can see their diverse lived experiences represented are Ellis (2010) selecting picturebooks on aspects of diversity, PEPELT (2018 – 2023) selecting picturebooks on global issues, and Ellis and Gruenbaum (2023) selecting picturebooks on social and life issues and the environment. From 2019 – 2022, the ICEPELL Project focused on picturebooks which contained subject matter relevant for intercultural citizenship education.
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Alter, G.& Merse, T. (2023). Re-thinking Picturebooks for Intermediate and Advanced Learners: Perspectives for Secondary English Language Education. Narr Francke Attempto Verlag.
Bland, J. (2013). Children’s Literature and Learner Empowerment – Children and Teenagers in English Language Education. Bloomsbury Academic.
Ellis, G. & Brewster, J. (1991). The Storytelling Handbook for Primary Teachers. Penguin English.
Ellis, G. & Brewster, J. (2002). Tell it Again! The New Storytelling Handbook for Primary Teachers. Longman Pearson.
Garvie, E. (1990). Story as Vehicle. Multilingual Matters.
Ghosn, I-K. (2013). Storybridge to Second Language Literacy. The Theory, Research and Practice of Teaching English with Children’s Literature. Information Age Publishing.
Hester, H. (1983). Stories in the Multilingual Primary Classroom. ILEA.
Mourão, S. & Bland, J.(2016). Editorial: The Journey. Children’s Literature in English Language Education. 4/2, ii-xi.
Rixon, S. (1992). English and other languages for younger children: practice and theory in a rapidly changing world. Language Teaching, April, pp. 73 – 79.
Opal Dunn
- Dunn. O. (1997 – 2004). REALBOOK News. Issues 1 – 15.
- Dunn, O. (2016). Using Picture Books – Fifty Pioneering Years. C&TS Special Pearl Jubilee Edition 1986 – 2016, IAFTEL Young Learners & Teenagers Special Interest Group.
- Valente, D. Enever, J, Dunn, O. (2020). Special Congratulatory Feature ELTons 2020 Outstanding Achievement Award Winner. TEYLT Worldwide: The newsletter of the IATEFL Young Learners and Teenagers Special Interest Group. Issue 2, pp. 10 – 14.
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Ellis, G. (2010). Promoting diversity through children’s literature. British Council. | Read More |
Ellis, G., Brewster, J. (2014). Tell it Again! The Storytelling Handbook for Primary English Language Teachers. British Council | Read More |
Ellis, G., Gruenbaum, T. (2023). Picturebook lesson series: Exploring Social Issues. British Council. | Read More |
Enever, J. & Schmid-Schönbein, G. (Eds.). 2006. Picturebooks and Young Learners of English. Munich: Langenscheidt. | Read More |
CLELEjournal Editorial Report for 10th anniversary | Read More |
Picturebooks in ELT Blog | Read More |
ICEPELL | Read More |
