Notes on Books for Babies 

•As we consider books for the very young, we must remember that for babies, reading is social-it’s an experience shared with adults.

•There are some basic ideas that the baby must learn when it comes to the reading experience:

•A book is to be looked at and read, not eaten

•A book must be held in a specific way

•A story must be read from left to right (in English)

•A baby must be able to understand up from down

•Representations of objects have to be learned

•This can be tricky-movement has to be represented by the illustrator. How does a baby know that a character is moving?

 

 

•Go to the library or to your own personal library and pick out a few baby books.

•I would recommend We’re Going on a Bear Hunt (Rosen & Oxenbury)

•This is a great book-there’s even a smaller board book version-I found this at T.J. Maxx.

•Some interesting observations about this book:

•In one of the black and white spreads, the characters are shown from their waist up because they’re walking in the grass. To the baby, however, the characters may simply look as if they have no legs.

•There’s definitely a sound element to this text-very appealing to the young child.

 

•Other things to consider:

•The size of the figures fluctuates

•There are multiple perspective changes

•What do particular marks mean? (snow, text, etc.)

•A child must learn to understand sequence and cause and effect. Example: First this happened, then this happened, etc.

•Images of fear: does the child understand?

•Static (not moving) representations of things that move in real life could be complicated for babies. 

•Material in books: things never encountered in real life.

•Even though these elements of the book may be complicated, it’s a learning experience for the baby.

 

 

•With a double spread in a picture book, the characters on the left page may be represented as moving to the scene on the right page. The reader must be aware that this is what is happening.

•However, a young child may think a girl in the second picture is different from the same girl in the first picture.

•The reader has to fill in gaps in a book. For example, the reader has to fill in the gap that the characters on one page are the same characters on the following page, though they may be doing different things. Generally, readers have to fill in multiple “gaps” during the reading experience. These gaps represent an element of the text that only makes sense to the reader by using previous knowledge.

 

 

•There are many types of baby books:

•Alphabet Books

•Counting Books

•Books of rhymes

•Novelty Books: contains activities-flaps, etc.

•What kind of baby books do you give your children or other children?

•Are there any types of baby books that seem more appealing than others?

 

 

•Some baby books to check out:

•Goodnight Moon by Margaret Wise Brown

•Guess How Much I Love You (McBratney & Jeram)

•Peepo (Ahlberg)

•The Very Hungry Caterpillar (Carle)

•Spot Books (Hill)

•Elmer (McKee)

•The Little Bear Book (Browne)

•Dear Zoo (Campbell)