As I believe that I have mentioned before, when I was in middle school I loved comic books. Why? They were short, action packed, and easy to talk about with my peers. I often dispaired when I was unable to follow a really good story line due to being unable to access the next edition of a particular comic book, and I frequently went back and reread my favorite parts of the story. This allowed me time to internalize many of the new words that were introduced in the story, which helped to increase my vocabulary.
My students, like those that Lyga mentioned, seem to get quite a lot of information from the pictures. They help students to understand the setting, show characters’ emotions, and allow other nonverbal things to help advance the plot of the story. Sometimes the pictures are so packed full of information in and of themselves that they remind me of the saying, “A picture is worth a thousand words.”
I found it interesting that Lyga also included how to find comic books and graphic novels that were appropriate to the students’ developmental level.
Yes! I was thinking the exact same thing when you said, “A picture is worth a thousand words.” It’s so valuable for children to be able to use pictures (which children of all ages love…) to study the structure of stories and characters’ motivations and everything.
And, I have a lot of students who are like you were – they pick up the comic books on my shelf to read on an everyday basis. At the beginning of the year, they asked me if those were still considered “reading” and if it was okay for them to read those during Readers’ Workshop time, and I said, YES, of course it’s reading!
I think graphic novels help kids to feel like they are reading something they want to read and will enjoy rather than just another assigned reading. It is already written in a context they choose to pick up but now it is being used for instructional methods. I really think these would inspire they apathetic students to get involved.