Teaching With Picture Books in the Middle School

Discover how picture books, a time-honored tool among elementary reading teachers, can also be used to engage sixth, seventh, and eighth graders in meaningful learning activities. Teaching With Picture Books in the Middle School invites you to take a closer look at these books, many of which present complex ideas suitable for older students. These books are rich with diverse subject matter that comes to life through beautiful illustrations, and offer engaging models for writing, such as fables and pourquoi tales, autobiographies, and poetry. Older students enjoy sharing picture books with younger children, and can polish their oral language skills as they practice reading aloud, dramatizing, or storytelling as ways of engaging beginning readers.

Find out which picture books are appropriate for middle school students, and experiment with reproducible lesson plans and activities that will foster reading and writing skills not only in the language arts classroom, but in other subject areas as well.

Iris McClellan Tiedt is Dean of Education Emerita from Minnesota State University at Moorhead, Moorhead, Minnesota, USA.