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Comic Books Improve Early Childhood Literacy

Posted by timothy on from the shore-helped-mee dept.

Hugh Pickens writes "The Telegraph reports that Professor Carol Tilley, a professor of library and information science at the University of Illinois, says that comics are just as sophisticated as other forms of reading, children benefit from reading them at least as much as they do from reading other kinds of books, and that there is evidence that comics increase children's vocabulary and instill a love of reading. 'A lot of the criticism of comics and comic books come from people who think that kids are just looking at the pictures and not putting them together with the words,' says Tilley. 'But you could easily make some of the same criticisms of picture books – that kids are just looking at pictures, and not at the words.' Tilley says that some of the condescension toward comics as a medium may come from the connotations that the name itself evokes but that the distinct comic book aesthetic — frames, thought and speech bubbles, motion lines, to name a few — has been co-opted by children's books, creating a hybrid format."

5 of 127 comments (clear)

  1. What's the difference by Hognoxious · · Score: 5, Funny

    Q: What's the difference between a comic and a graphic novel?

    A: About twenty quid.

    [kadradabumTISH!]

    --
    Confucius say, "Find worm in apple - bad. Find half a worm - worse."
  2. Also foreign language learning. . . by bogidu · · Score: 5, Insightful

    I lived in Spain for a year, spoke/read very little spanish when I moved there and read alot of x-men comic books. They did help me pick up vocabulary and common expressions and such. Anyone who things that any form of reading cannot help just due to it's content is just being prejudicial against the material.

    1. Re:Also foreign language learning. . . by gmanterry · · Score: 5, Interesting

      I had the same experience when the Peace Corps sent me to French West Africa. French books use different tenses than spoken French. We spent three months learning French. I could order a meal, rent a car, etc, but I could not carry on a conversation. A friend suggested I buy some French comics. They are all written is 'spoken' French. It helped me a lot. I would suggest to anyone learning a foreign language to read comics in that foreign language. Terry

      --
      Since when is "public safety" the root password to the Constitution?
  3. Re:No doubt. by heritage727 · · Score: 5, Funny

    There's an art to reading graphic novels, and knowing how to read them. To analyze the frames for relative action to the story and so on. I for one have never been as good at understanding comics as I have traditional literature.

    I agree. My 13 year-old son can read a graphic novel and tell me the story in great detail. When I look at one of his books it's just a bunch of random explosions and women with bizarrely large breasts.

  4. Comment removed by account_deleted · · Score: 5, Informative

    Comment removed based on user account deletion