Books Without Words

One of my new favorite types of books is books without words. I think there is a lot of potential to build a child's reading comprehension skills and overall personal literacy story when presenting a child with different forms of literature. I have included 5 of my current favorite wordless books in this post. I am sure that I will be adding many more to my favorites in the future.

These first two books were my first wordless reads. In Flora and the Penguin Flora ice skates alongside a penguin friend in Flora and the Flamingo Flora synchronize swim/dances alongside a flamingo friend. These books are beautifully drawn. Anyone of any age can appreciate the effort and skill that went in to making Flora's worlds a reality, at least in book world. The other thing that is really cool about these books are the interactive flaps that help mimic the movement of dance and skating.

 

Journey of the Sea Glass is absolutely my favorite wordless book. This book tells the story of how a bottle of lemon-lime soda becomes a piece of sea glass that floats to shore. This story involves a lot of thought and there is a lot to interpret in the story. First it can be difficult to spot the piece of glass in each frame of the story. Second this story can bring about discussions about pollution because even though sea glass is a cool thing to find on the beach, if the glass were say a piece of plastic or some type of substance that were harmful to the environment that it traveled in this story might be very different. Finally the more perceptive reader may pick up on the idea that the boy who drops the bottle is also the grandfather of the girl who finds the piece of sea glass. 

I think this book can be read and looked at as a very simple, nice story with beautiful illustrations OR it can be a very deep and meaningful story that can lead to an array of topic discussions with audiences young and old. 

These next two books by Mark Pett are also amazing choices because like Journey of the Sea Glass both stories show change over a long period of time and they both can open up conversations about deeper, meaningful concepts. 

The Boy and The Airplane tells the story of a young boy who gets a toy airplane. Soon this toy becomes one of his favorite toys. Like most favorite toys he eventually looses his airplane. The story proceeds to show how he gets his favorite toy back. 

The Girl and the Bicycle tells the story of a young girl who finds the bicycle of her dreams. The book shows her journey to getting the bike.

Both stories make statements about patience, hard work, dedication, and kindness. Both stories can open up conversations with young people about times when they have had to be patient and work for something that they really wanted. They also could work as good remedy books for parents who are dealing with children who exhibit opposite behaviors than are discussed in the books. 

These are just a few of my favorite books without words. I'm sure there will be many more posts like this one in the future.