October 2004 — Web/Net

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The Software Picture Book: The Complexities of Teaching Informational Text to Elementary School Children

By Richard A.Giaquinto, Ph.D., Saint Francis College, Brooklyn, NY

  • A Scavenger Hunt in which participants skimmed available textbooks and identified the informational text structures that were present and would require explicit instruction. They then prepared PowerPoint presentations that outlined their findings. Examples of two slides appear below (both slides are compilations of the work of several groups in the class):

  • Informational Text Jeopardy in which groups prepared clues for either science or social studies content in the form of informational text with appropriate structures. The groups then presented the clues to each other in a simulation of the Jeopardy-game format found on daily television. Groups had to prepare a PowerPoint presentation for their clues. Please see the PowerPoint slide below for two examples of these slides (both slides were examples used to review the use of PowerPoint):

HyperStudio

We decided to utilize HyperStudio 4.0 as the software program for the S.A.M.E. Project. It was selected because it allows participants to complete the following picture book-related tasks:

  • Construct storyboards that allow users to plan and revise content.
  • Create a stack (for our purposes a picture book) with a number of individual cards (for our purposes pages of the picture book).
  • Draw and animate pictures for each card.
  • Insert and paste pictures from stored files.
  • Insert and animate objects from program files.
  • Utilize transitions between various cards.
  • Compose text with available fonts and colors.
  • Create text features that are characteristic of informational text (e.g., colored print, captions, diagrams and illustrations).
  • Revise and edit work.
  • Add or record sound(s) to enrich the text.
  • Present and share a completed work with others.

The inclusion of the text features in the picture books identified above served several purposes. First, it would help familiarize participants with the text features of informational texts. Next, it would enable participants to create picture books that were typical of the genre. Finally, it provided a useful tool for participants to explore the power of HyperStudio 4.0.

Illustrations and Topics

According to Cullinan and Galda (1998), picture books contain six different styles of art:

  1. Representational art
  2. Surrealistic art
  3. Impressionistic art
  4. Folk art
  5. Naive art
  6. Cartoon art

Participants again used a Webquest to identify these art styles. After this, participants completed additional searches to identify popular authors and illustrators of picture books. The information gathered allowed participants the opportunity to investigate how authors and illustrators use art to support the meaning found in text.

Each group then selected a topic following a review of curriculum and standards for childhood education. Some of the topics selected were as follows: