Genres in Children’s Literature

PICTURE BOOKS

* Indicates a book I would put in my top ten for that genre, if I had a top ten.

Broad Genre: Picture Book: A children’s picture book has pictures to accompany the text. It differs from an illustrated book in the quantity and size of the pictures in proportion to the text. Picture books generally have at least as much graphic illustration as text. The picture book was originally designed for readers from ages four to eight.  Today picture books for babies and older readers are in sufficient numbers that they can be designated as sub-genres. 

Genre

Definition

Examples

Books for the Very Young

Board books

For babies and preschoolers. These books have heavy cardboard pages that hold up to the chewing and wild page-turning skills of babies and little ones. Some board books are also shaped like the their topic items: trains, spoons, cookies, etc.

Eating.  Working. Playing. A series* of board books by Helen Oxenbury

I Want to Be Your Personal Penguin* by Sandra Boynton

Max’s Chocolate Chicken* by Rosemary Wells

Toy books, Interactive Books, Pop-up books, moveable books

These are: books that allow the reader to interact by moving or pulling tabs, books that pop-up when the reader opens the pages, books that are die-cut, books made of cloth or plastic or other unusual but child –friendly material. Books that integrate other items into them

The Very Hungry Caterpillar* by Eric Carle

Pat the Bunny* by Dorothy Kunhardt

One Red Dot by David A. Carter

The Night before Christmas: a Pop-Up* by Clement Moore; paper engineering by Robert Sabuda

Big books

Large editions (i.e. 24” x 36”) of picture books to share with whole classes or small groups so that all can see the pictures. Accompanied at times by smaller books so children can read along or read on their own later.

The Day Jimmy’s Boa Ate The Wash* by Trinka Hakes Noble

It Looked Like Spilt Milk* by Charles Shaw

 

 

 

Concept Development

Develops a particular concept or idea for young readers and listeners such as color, shape, size, relational words, prepositions, math and science ideas

        Concept Book

color, shape, size, relational words, prepositions, many more

I Fall Down*  by Vickie Cobb (gravity)

Anno’s Multiplying Jar by Anno (factorials)

Actual Size * by Steve Jenkins (size relationships)

 

        Alphabet

A type of concept book that has enough books to generate its own genre.  Of course, alphabet and counting books came way before concept books.

Alphabatics by Suze MacDonald

Eating the Alphabet*  by Lois Ehlert

A My Name is Alice* by Jane Bayer

        Counting

A type of concept book that has enough books to generate its own genre.  Of course, alphabet and counting books came way before concept books.

Count and  See by Tana Hoban (1-100)

26 Letters and 99 Cents* by Tana Hoban

Five Little Monkeys Jumping on the Bed  by Eileen Christelow

     

 

 

Language Development

Provide clues to both oral and written language, vocabulary expansion, phonemic awareness, print awareness, how words are used in books, word recognition, etc.

       Nursery rhymes, lullabies

Emerging from Mother Goose rhymes and songs from the oral tradition

Animal Crackers. Illus. by Jane Dyer

Mary Had a Little Lamb* by Sarah Josepha Hale

Read Aloud Rhymes for the Very Young. Selected by Jack Prelutsky

       Pattern

Emerging from cumulative stories in the oral tradition. Rhythmic, rhyming, books that repeat phrases, words, events. May or may not be a “story.”

Very young children like event based picture books.

Brown Bear, Brown Bear What Do You See? by Bill Martin Jr.; pictures by Eric Carle

Mr. Seahorse by Eric Carle

Where’s Spot? * by Eric Hill (also a board book)

       Stories in rhyme

Stories that are told in rhyme. They may or may not have the repetitive events of pattern books, but have poetic characteristics, rhythm and rhyme.

Madeline* by Ludwig Bemelmans

Chicka-Chicka-Boom-Boom by Bill Martin, Jr. and John Archambault; illus. by Lois Ehlert

       Picture-Story Book

The integration of pictures and story to such a degree that neither words nor pictures can stand on their own. Includes the elements of fiction: characters, plot, setting, theme, point of view, tone.

Books must also be viewed with an eye toward the characteristics of visual graphic evaluation: line, shape, color, composition.  A major source for read-aloud choices, the language is often above student level, but it allows them to hear how the written word sounds.

Tale of Peter Rabbit* by Beatrix Potter

Where the Wild Things Are* by Maurice Sendak

Caps for Sale* by Esphyr Slobodkina

Millions of Cats by Wanda Gag

 

Illustrated Traditional Literature

Folklorists in the 19th and 20th centuries collected stories that might have been lost to us forever. The folklorists with an ear for written language retold these stories. Illustrators still use some of these classic retellings as a venue for their illustrations. Reteller can be the artist, or a collaborator.

Little Red Riding Hood*; retold and illus. by Trina Schart Hyman.

 

Little Red Riding Hood; retold and illus. by Jerry Pinkney.

 

 

 

Books for Beginning Readers

Books for Beginning Readers: Trade beginning-to-read books start at about LEVEL  E  in Guided Reading.  These books are sized similarly with large print and plenty of white space.

The transitional novel is a short novel with large print and chapters. Children call them "chapter books."  Many of the series  that comprise these books are bare outlines of story with little character development. Some of the characters are "over the top" to draw the reader's attention. These are books that children can read quickly giving them a very real sense of accomplishment.

 

I Can Read Books and many other series of primers for beginning readers.

The Foot Book by Dr. Seuss

Hop on Pop by Dr. Seuss

The Cat in the Hat * by Dr. Seuss

Little Bear*  by Else Minarik; pictures by Maurice Sendak

Frog and Toad Are Friends * by Arnold Lobel

Hi! Fly Guy*  by Tedd Arnold

 

The transitional novel or beginning chapter book (See series books and types of stories).

The Littles by John Peterson

Flat Stanley by Jeff Brown

Captain Underpants by Dav Pilkey

Junie B. Jones by Barbara Parks

Clementine* by Sara Pennypacker

 

 

 

Nonfiction for Young Readers

Development of academic and scientific subjects

Easy to read nonfiction is entering a new era with books for the young that have real information in them. Subjects are subdivided; rather than one book on bears, there is a book for each type of bear.

Publishers doing this well are KidsPower Press, Crabtree Press, Kids Can Press, Capstone Press, and Pebble Books. Great for research, small group and whole class.

Walk On! A Guide for Babies of All Ages* by Marla Frazee

Caribou by Helen Frost (Capstone)

Magic School Bus series by Joanna Cole; illus. by Bruce Degan

Biography/Autobiography

For young children, biographies often contain one event that exemplifies the personality or character of the person, rather than a life story. Usually important dates or facts are included or appended.

Minty; A Story of Young Harriet Tubman* By Alan Schroeder; illus. by Jerry Pinkney.

 

When Marian Sang; the True Recital of Marian Anderson, The Voice of a Century* by Pam Munoz Ryan; illus. by Brian Selznik

 

Picture Books for Older Readers Becoming a group of its own, picture books for older readers includes picture-story books, alphabet books, and number books, stories in rhyme, interactive books, wordless books, graphic novels, illustrated traditional literature, nonfiction and biography. These books also may be subdivided into types of fiction (i.e. historical fiction, fantasy, realistic fiction, etc.)

 

 

 

The key feature of these books is that they develop concepts and have themes for older readers but are in picture book format.

Smoky Night *by Eve Bunting and David Diaz

Golem* by David Wisniewski

Crow Boy* by Taro Yashima

The Dinosaurs of Waterhouse Hawkins by Barbara Kerley; illus. by Brian Selznik.

Hiroshima No Pika* by Toshi Maruki

Rose Blanche* by Roberto Innocenti

Anno’s Multiplying Jar by Anno (factorials)

Graphic novels

Emerging from the comic books of the 20th century,

This genre may become a legitimate literary genre if others like Brian Selznik continue to explore its possibilities.

The Invention of Hugo Cabret by Brian Selznik.

Babymouse; Queen of the World by Jennifer Holm

Bone by Jeff Smith

Stories without words

Books in which the entire stories are told without benefit of words.

Time Flies by Eric Rohmann

Zoom*  by Istvan Banyai

Anno’s Journey*  by Anno

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