Picturebooks can be used in ELT for three main purposes:

1. Purely for enjoyment and for the shared social experience of listening to a story together. This contributes naturally to learners’ language and literacy development, for example, as a regular ‘storytime’ event in the class calendar, such as once a week.
2. As one of many resources integrated into a teaching and learning sequence. Picturebooks are used occasionally to supplement and complement teaching materials or to link with and develop a subject in the curriculum. Using a picturebook provides variety and exposes learners to the target language in a meaningful way, supporting and extending their acquisition of topic-related language and helping them achieve their learning objectives. Time spent using the picturebook can vary.
3. As the principal teaching material and source for planning and implementing a picturebook-based ELT pedagogy, where all activities and learning outcomes are structured around the concepts, themes, language or even illustrative style of a variety of picturebooks.

The second and third purposes (see Introduction) involve planning learning sequences around a picturebook, incorporating the before, during and after stages associated with skills-based activities. These can include several steps or stages (see, for example, e-lessons guidelines and the picturebook lessons series ‘Exploring social issues’). Furthermore, a picturebook-based ELT pedagogy can be embedded in a children’s rights perspective by adopting a children’s rights pedagogy.

Ellis and Brewster’s story-based methodology has been seminal in offering a structure for picturebook-based EFL lessons. It comprises three components for preparing and teaching a story-based EFL lesson: Plan, Do and Review. This model of reflection can be applied to both individual activities and the overall structure of picturebook-based lessons.

Picturebook pedagogy is evolving to view picturebooks as multimodal objects, encouraging meaning-making from both words and pictures and considering the book as a whole, including its design and peritextual features.

Using picturebooks as the principal teaching material involves their use for:

• Short, intensive courses structured around one picturebook to constitute a mini-syllabus.
• Year-long courses structured around, for example, six to eight different picturebooks to constitute a picturebook-based syllabus (see pages 11 and 13 of Tell it Again!). Teaching and learning sequences can cover between 6 and 12 hours for each picturebook, depending on the time allocated for English language learning. Picturebooks need to be selected carefully to cover a range of genres, themes and settings. Otherwise, learners may develop highly specialised, low-frequency vocabulary while missing gaps in their basic vocabulary.

Picturebook-based ELT pedagogy requires systematic pre-service and in-service teacher education and professional development to develop the specific skills and competencies (see Skills and competencies) needed to implement effective picturebook-based lessons. These can be classified under the main areas of teacher education: attitudes and values that language teaching should encourage and promote; knowledge and understanding central to language teaching and the diversity of teaching and learning; and classroom strategies and skills. Many of these skills and competencies are interrelated and can inform the design of teacher education programmes.

Programmes can be designed around a Plan-Do-Review cycle to combine personal reflection and experimentation and develop participants’ critical awareness of effective picturebook-based pedagogy. This includes a balance of theory and practical implementation of age-appropriate techniques and materials, followed by analysis and reflection. These can be achieved through a combination of trainer input, practical demonstrations, experiential learning, problem-solving, discussion activities and creative-thinking tasks.

Although teachers may initially find it difficult to imagine how they can implement a picturebook-based pedagogy, their knowledge and skills will grow as they experiment with this approach, helping them become more experienced and confident. Consequently, they may find it difficult to return to conventional ELT materials, which often remain at the mundane and utilitarian level of basic dialogues and daily activities. Picturebooks address universal themes and allow children and teachers to think about and discuss important issues.

To implement effective picturebook-based ELT pedagogy, teachers need to acquire a combination of knowledge, skills and abilities:

Know the baseline: Be familiar with a range of picturebooks; understand the picturebook as an art form, an aesthetic object and a multimodal text; understand how words and pictures interact to make meaning; recognise the key characteristics and features of picturebooks, including peritextual features; and understand the benefits of a picturebook-based pedagogy.

Select picturebooks: Be able to identify picturebooks suitable for a particular class in terms of linguistic and cognitive levels, cultural and age-related needs, and the needs of a diverse group of learners. Some picturebooks can also support Content and Language Integrated Learning (CLIL).

Develop materials: Be able to draw on existing materials and adapt them to the relevant context; plan a programme of work with meaningful and purposeful objectives and outcomes; assess learning; and promote learner autonomy by encouraging learners to reflect on their learning. See, for example, the e-lessons guidelines, the picturebook lessons series ‘Exploring social issues’ by Ellis and Gruenbaum, and the teaching resources developed by the ICEPELL Project. These provide a solid foundation for developing materials.

Prepare context: Be able to explain the context (e.g. social or historical) within the picturebook’s narrative, use bias-free language, and promote positive values, attitudes and behaviour.

Read aloud: Be able to conduct an effective, interactive read-aloud and use read-aloud talk.

Listen: Be able to understand how listening skills can be developed through repetition, rhythm, intonation and pronunciation, and how listening for general or specific understanding can be developed through visual and audio clues. It is also important to listen to and respect children’s views and personal responses to a picturebook.

Speak: Be able to guide picturebook-based discussions. Learners may be quick to interpret images, which can influence the scope of a discussion. Oral skills should therefore go beyond modelling vocabulary to include clarity, pace and rhythm of speech.

Read and write: Be able to recognise the importance of the written word and encourage learners to develop their reading and writing skills through various individual or group activities based on words and picturebooks.

View: Be able to understand how viewing, for example, a picturebook read-aloud or trailer, can help learners acquire information and appreciate ideas and events through auditory and visual modes. These provide a multimodal experience that conveys meaning and supports understanding.

In addition, attention may need to be given to a teacher’s language proficiency and level of confidence, recognising the interconnectedness of the skills and competencies required for effective picturebook-based pedagogy. Teachers may also need to reflect on their own theories and constructions of children and childhood, as well as the power dynamics in the adult-child relationship, to plan for an interactive approach to reading aloud.

• Ellis, G., & Brewster, J. (2014). Tell it Again! The Storytelling Handbook for Primary English Language Teachers. British Council, pp. 22–24.
• Ellis, G., & Gruenbaum, T. (2023). Picturebook lesson series: Exploring social issues. British Council.
• Ellis, G., & Gruenbaum, T. (2023). Reimagining picturebook pedagogy for online primary English language education. In D. Valente & D. Xerri (Eds.), Innovative Practices in Early English Language Education (pp. 147–170). Palgrave.
• Ellis, G., & Mourão, S. (2021). ‘Demystifying the read-aloud in early English language learning’. English Teaching Professional, Issue 136.
• Gruenbaum, T. (2021). Exploring Picturebooks as a Teaching Tool in Initial Primary English Teacher Education in the Netherlands. Unpublished doctoral thesis, Institute of Education, University College London. Open Access UCL Discovery.
• ICEPELL Consortium. (2022). The ICEGuide: A Handbook for Intercultural Citizenship Education Through Picturebooks in Early English Language Learning. Lisbon: CETAPS, NOVA FCSH.