Bilderboken mångfald och möjligheter [Multiplicity/Diversity and potential of picture books] (review)

Sweden

As a literary educationalist, Agneta Edwards not only works with children, but also heads workshops in reading promotion. Her book draws on her practical experience and thus offers hands-on advice for the reading of picture books with kindergarten and preschool children. It is divided into four chapters, the first of which, for example, explains the nexus between reading aloud and the development of linguistic and social competence. This is followed by guidelines for reading promotion programs in class settings. Here, Edwards gives detailed accounts of the objectives and possible activities of "book hours." The third and longest chapter explores the aesthetics of the picture book, thereby substantiating the practical work with texts and images through more theoretically oriented scholarship. Edwards proposes questions that educators or parents could ask the children following the shared reading of a text. She coaches both the mediating adult and the child to discern pictorial compositions, traditions, and techniques as well as textual structures and the interplay between text and images. In the last chapter, Edwards provides a thematically organized list of picture books that especially lend themselves to reading aloud and book discussion. The concluding bibliography-- as well as the user-friendly layout of the book which identifies the four chapters with different colors and complements the main text with many illustrations and quotes from scholars, parents, and educators in the margins -- all work together to make this an excellent handbook.

Ines Galling