Mediation refers to the support, often referred to as scaffolding, provided by the teacher when using picturebooks to help learners construct meaning. It also encourages children to use English as much as possible to talk about what they see and understand, and to make links to their own lived experiences. Picturebook mediation depends on the teacher using a combination of competencies effectively to plan and manage an inclusive and effective picturebook experience. Picturebook mediation can be divided into three stages:

1. The pre-read-aloud: This includes selecting the picturebook and preparing for the read-aloud by finding a point of entry to ignite interest and curiosity and stimulate prior knowledge. If necessary, this stage might involve pre-teaching key language items and clarifying unfamiliar cultural or contextual details. It is also useful to prepare by rehearsing the read-aloud, practising how to decode the verbal text and use punctuation as a guide for pausing, adding emphasis, and differentiating between dialogue and narrative, statements and questions. Consider how the pictures and words interact so you know when to turn the page. This helps pace the read-aloud experience, unfold the story, and convey mood.
2. The read-aloud: The mediator uses a combination of techniques to create a multimodal, language-rich event. This is achieved through expressive techniques that maintain learners’ interest and concentration and support them during the read-aloud.
3. The post-read-aloud: This stage depends on the purpose for using the picturebook. For purposes ii and iii, the teacher may plan a variety of multisensory follow-up activities that stimulate learners to think, reflect, give personal responses, and extend their learning.

A read-aloud is a shared social experience in which you and your learners share the emotions, humour, action, suspense, anticipation, and surprise of the story. You need to create a natural communicative situation in which learners can interact with you, the picturebook, and each other. Picturebook read-alouds provide exposure to rich, authentic language and illustrations, which play an important role in the meaning-making process. The challenge for a teacher is to mediate the read-aloud effectively so that learners’ interest and attention are maintained and, at the end of the read-aloud, they feel accomplished and positive about the experience.

Consider the following guidelines:

1. Decide where you will sit or stand and whether you may need to walk around your classroom so all learners can hear you and see the illustrations. Consider whether you have a suitable space for read-aloud sessions.
2. Use read-aloud talk that goes beyond reading the verbal text of the picturebook. This can be used for:
   • Managing the read-aloud and establishing familiar routines, setting up and closing the session, and inviting children to join in with repeated words, phrases, or refrains.
   • Giving information about the picturebook creators and discussing the peritext (front and back covers, endpapers, title pages, etc.). Teach children the language they need to discuss picturebooks and appreciate their different features. Use the peritext to encourage children to predict the content, then return to it after sharing the picturebook to help them make connections. Teach children phrases they can use to discuss the picturebook, such as “I think it will be a story about …” and “I like the way the illustrator has drawn the …”
   • Asking questions to activate background or prior knowledge and involving learners by relating the picturebook’s theme to their own experiences. Encourage learners to notice, predict, infer, think, and reflect on similarities and differences between their own lives and what they discover in the picturebook. Ask children to consider who the narrator is, for example, which pronouns are used (he, she, they, I, or we) and what effect this has. Who is the assumed audience? Who are the main characters, and how are they portrayed?
   • Repeating key words or phrases, expanding on the verbal text, rephrasing ideas, and modelling the use of shared classroom language. Describe what is happening in the illustrations and model being a thoughtful reader by sharing personal interpretations, thinking aloud, hypothesising, pondering, speculating, and sharing personal information.
3. Use expressive techniques involving the body, eyes, and voice, including gestures, facial expressions, actions, positioning, posture, gaze, and eye contact with learners. Use expression to convey meaning and emotion, and vary stress, intonation, tone, volume, pace, and pauses. Consider how sound effects, puppets, visuals, or realia can help convey emotions, feelings, and events and support children’s understanding.

• Ellis, G., & Brewster, J. (2014). Tell it Again! The Storytelling Handbook for Primary English Language Teachers. British Council, pp. 25–27.
• Ellis, G., & Mourão, S. (2021). Demystifying the read-aloud. English Teaching Professional, Issue 136.
• Dialogic Reading Aloud
• Reading Aloud Online Guidelines