Picture+Story+Books



//The best children’s books are about the complex ////business of being human. // //They may seem to be about ////rats and pigs and rabbits and koalas and all manner of ////unlikely adventures, but they’re not really. // //They’re about ////people. They are about Life with a capital ‘L’. // //They are ////concerned with the transmission of human values to ////a group of readers and listeners who are at a crucial ////stage of discovering how the world works and how ////they might live. // //In practice picture books are strong on story and they’re ////subtle on metaphor. // //They’re simple and direct in their ////<span style="color: #e46900; font-family: 'Reader-Italic','sans-serif'; font-size: 12px;">telling (the author’s voice is intimate and personal), and ////<span style="color: #e46900; font-family: 'Reader-Italic','sans-serif'; font-size: 12px;">complex and insinuating in their meaning. // //<span style="color: #e46900; font-family: 'Reader-Italic','sans-serif'; font-size: 12px;">They focus on the particular as a means of understanding ////<span style="color: #e46900; font-family: 'Reader-Italic','sans-serif'; font-size: 12px;">the abstract – as children do. They are exploratory ////<span style="color: #e46900; font-family: 'Reader-Italic','sans-serif'; font-size: 12px;">(as children are). // //<span style="color: #e46900; font-family: 'Reader-Italic','sans-serif'; font-size: 12px;">They’re preoccupied with rights and ////<span style="color: #e46900; font-family: 'Reader-Italic','sans-serif'; font-size: 12px;">wrongs – as children are – without being moralistic. // //<span style="color: #e46900; font-family: 'Reader-Italic','sans-serif'; font-size: 12px;">They delight in the idiosyncratic – as children do. They’re ////<span style="color: #e46900; font-family: 'Reader-Italic','sans-serif'; font-size: 12px;">clear-sighted and truthful. They’re optimistic. // //<span style="color: #e46900; font-family: 'Reader-Italic','sans-serif'; font-size: 12px;">Above all ////<span style="color: #e46900; font-family: 'Reader-Italic','sans-serif'; font-size: 12px;">they are playfully serious – or seriously playful. // <span style="color: black; font-family: 'Reader-Italic','sans-serif'; font-size: 11px;">(Ros Price, ‘Women’s Book Review 1990–1991’, in //Creative// //<span style="color: black; font-family: 'Reader-Italic','sans-serif'; font-size: 11px;">Connections: Writing, Illustrating and Publishing Children’s ////<span style="color: black; font-family: 'Reader-Italic','sans-serif'; font-size: 11px;">Books in Australia, //<span style="color: black; font-family: 'Reader-Italic','sans-serif'; font-size: 11px;">papers of the Canberra Children’s Book Council, seminars 1987–1993)

Shaun Tan - Picture Books: Who are they for?

[|What is a picture book?] Picture books on [|Wikipedia]

__ Story Time Presentation Pages __ __ Postmodern Picture Story Books __
 * Assessment Tasks **


 * Historical Influences on Picturebooks **


 * Resources:**
 * Children's Book Council**
 * Little Golden Books**
 * Development in Picture Books**
 * Literary Movements and Periods**

At the heart of any analysis of text we should be considering the following; - The structures, features and conventions used by the author to create meaning - The ways in which social, historical or cultural values and embedded in the text - The ways in which the text is open to different interpretations by different readers
 * Analysis of a Picture Book**

A type of picture book has developed over the last 3 decades which not only challenges traditional audiences, but also presents plots, characters and format in quite different ways. This new type picture book quite often contains contradictions, multiple or even indeterminate meanings and a mixing or pastiche of illustrative styles. The effect of all these changes is to produce a picture book which looks quite different and is to be read quite differently and has become known as the metafictive or postmodern picture book.

The Postmodern Picture book