Why Picture Books Are Important by Brett Helquist
Why are picture books important? I’d like to take that a little further and ask: Why are pictures in books important? I can only answer this question for myself. Reading was not easy for me. I had no trouble learning how to read, I just had trouble motivating myself to read. I had little interest in reading a story unless there was a strong picture to catch my interest. Good pictures always caught my eye and made me want to know the story behind the picture

Pictures added so much to the experience of reading a story. A well imagined picture invited me into the characters’ world and made me want to explore it in my imagination, to find out what was under that rock or behind that tree. Pictures helped me begin to create my own stories. It has been fun to watch my daughter learn to read. Long before she could read a word she told many stories of her own just by looking at the pictures in her favorite books. Her stories were often more fun than the story told in the text.

Pictures not only enhanced the reading experience but helped me to learn to read. When I struggled with a word or a passage, I could always use the pictures to help me figure it out. This became even more important as books became more complex. Later in life, I even taught myself to read Chinese by reading comic books. I could not have done it without those pictures.

I love picture books and books with pictures. I truly believe there’s not a book out there that wouldn’t be a bit better with a good picture or two.

Brett Helquist

About Brett Helquist
Brett Helquist’s celebrated art has graced books from the charming Roger, the Jolly Pirate and Dickens’s timeless Christmas Carol to the frightening Scary Stories collections by Alvin Schwartz and the alarming New York Times bestselling Series of Unfortunate Events by Lemony Snicket. He lives in Brooklyn, New York, with his family.

Why Picture Books Are Important by Joyce Wan
When I was young, my mom could not speak English but she took me to the library every week without fail. Although she was unable to read to me, picture books enabled us to enjoy the pictures and make up stories together. This would end up being one of her greatest gifts to me—the gift of imagination and creativity ignited by picture books.

As I learned to read, the combination of words and pictures completely immersed me into new worlds. Growing up in rough inner-city housing projects, picture books provided me with a safe refuge and possibilities of adventure, beauty, wonder, and humor. It was a doorway to the richness of the world and gave me hope and inspiration. It was where imagination bloomed and anything was possible. It is this spirit that I attribute all my successes to and which guides me in everything I do to this day.

Picture books empower the underprivileged and give hope to the voiceless. They have the power to capture your heart and transform your soul. They are the first interaction we have with books and that initial connection creates a ripple effect that lasts a lifetime and for generations to come.

Joyce Wan

About Joyce Wan
Joyce is the author and illustrator of Greetings from Kiwi and Pear (Blue Apple Books, 2009), You Are My Cupcake (Cartwheel Books, 2011), We Belong Together (Cartwheel Books, 2011) and has six more books underway. We Belong Together was 1 of 150 books nationwide to be featured in the Society of Illustrators 2011 Original Art Show, an exhibit that showcases the year’s best children’s books. She also owns a stationery and gift company called Wanart, and teaches courses on greeting card design and art licensing at New York’s School of Visual Arts helping others pursue their creative passions. Through all her work, Joyce hopes to inspire people to embrace the spirit of childhood and follow their dreams. Visit Joyce online at wanart.com

Why Picture Books Are Important by Bruce Whatley
Picture books are an important tool in teaching children to read but they are also a medium in their own right. There are stories that can only be told in the form of a picture book. They can create a magical, unexpected world for the reader pushing and challenging their imagination. The medium can also be used in a multitude of ways not only descriptive and informative but it can be the source of great humour. The gamut of emotions really.

The interplay of text and pictures is a very unique form of communication enabling the narrative to have many layers. The best picture books, either by design or accident, do this so that children and adults of all ages find something special in them.

My earliest memories of reading are Rupert Bear and a Circus Boy Annual. I was a late reader and with Rupert, I was so captivated by his world it didn’t matter that I couldn’t take in the text. Visual literacy is just as important as text based literacy especially as we are living in an increasingly visual world. While language is predominately a left brain function image making and appreciation is very much a right brain activity. So I’m sure the exposure to picture books at an early age can be very healthy, exercising the brain and stimulating the imagination.

But more than that – they’re great fun!

About Bruce Whatley
Bruce celebrates the 20th anniversary this year of his first book, The Ugliest Dog in the World. Since then he has written and/or illustrated over 60 picture books. They’ve starred a multitude of characters including some very ugly dogs, robots, royalty and a very moody wombat! Bruce is continually experimenting including using “his other hand” searching for new and better ways to tell his visual narratives.

Why Picture Books Are Important by Margie Palatini
When I was four, I fell in love with my hero.
He wasn’t faster than a speeding bullet.
Not the biggest. Nor the strongest.
Not the best looking of his bunch either.
He was sort of a quiet unassuming little guy, but ready and willing to help friends in need.
And wow, was he ever determined.

“I think I can. I think I can. I think I can… I thought I could.”

Oh, I love that Little Engine.
Loved him then, (which is way too many years to count backwards.)
Love him now.
Love that children of every age are still falling in love with him.

Picture book characters and their stories are like that.
They stay with you.
They are your “forever friends.”
Their tales punctuate life with memories of love, laughter (Pigeon “markers” perhaps?), and sometimes tears. (I know that no matter how many times I get to the end of The Polar Express, I’m swallowing hard when I hear that bell ring.)
You too?

The emotional connection a mere thirty-two pages has with a reader is powerful stuff.
…It’s the best stuff.

Margie Palatini

About Margie Palatini
Margie Palatini is the author of over three dozen popular and award-winning funny picture books including Sweet Tooth, Bedhead, (Simon & Schuster), the Bad Boys series, (HarperCollins), and the perennial favorite, Piggie Pie! (Clarion). She’s a Jersey Girl. Visit her and her bunch of characters at margiepalatini.com.

Why Picture Books Are Important by Tara Lazar
Picture books are important because they remind us that anything is possible. There are no boundaries in picture books, no walls, no restrictions. Children are constantly being told what to do — at home, in school, and out in public. Picture books let them know there’s a place without limits. (Psst, it’s called “the imagination”!)

In a picture book, a princess can float high in the sky and be saved by a kite, as in Florence Parry Heide’s Princess Hyacinth. A dragon can find a boy in the woods and take him to volcano-sitting lessons, like Timothy Knapman writes in Guess What I Found In Dragon Wood. Heck, even a shiny red pick-up truck can be a swimming pool! Just ask Bubba and Beau by Kathi Appelt. “Yee-haw, honey!”

In picture books, dreams come true, mysteries are solved, and magic happens with each turn of the page. Animals talk, children fly, and a woolly mammoth can be your best friend. In short, picture books are pure fun, and I simply cannot think of anything better than that.

About Tara Lazar
Tara Lazar’s debut picture book, The Monstore, will be released with the Aladdin imprint of Simon & Schuster next June. I Thought This Was a Bear Book will follow in 2014. Tara is also the creator of PiBoIdMo, a month-long writing initiative that encourages people to hatch one picture book idea per day during the month of November. She lives with her husband and daughters in New Jersey. If they had a dog, it would be a small white yappy thing named Schluffy. There’s oodles of picture book fun at taralazar.wordpress.com for writers, readers, and kids of all ages.

Why Picture Books Are Important by Jean Reidy
Have you ever seen kids with picture books they love? They carry them around like security blankets. They chew on them. They sleep with them. They wake with them. And in turn, those beloved books awaken in children a love of reading.

The first book my oldest son Patrick loved was Big Wheels by Anne Rockwell. We always had to have a copy checked out at one of the many branches of our library, so that there would always be one in the house. Finally, Santa got smart and brought Pat Big Wheels. Pat chose it over all the other gifts under the tree to take to bed on Christmas night. A reader was born.

Reading aloud conjures the magic of picture books. And a large part of that magic is what happens off the page… the cuddling, chatting, discovery, and discussion. And if you think the child is the only one who benefits, think again.

I remember — when I was very, very young — cracking up on the couch as my Italian grandmother read me The Cat in the Hat Beginner Book Dictionary. I know what you’re thinking – a dictionary? Really? But, believe me, no one writes a dictionary like Dr. Seuss. And no one read it like Nonna. Nonna barely spoke English, yet she narrated page after page in the funniest voices. I then filled in my own words … and voices. We were on our reading journey together.

When kids learn to love reading, they can explore worlds, both real and imaginary, beyond their experience. But for the very young, those first picture books help them understand themselves and their own world, whether it’s their universe, their town, their timeout corner, their closet of clothes or even their cozy bed.

Jean Reidy

About Jean Reidy
When she was little, Jean Reidy tried to be good, but sometimes her imaginary friends pulled her into trouble. These days she’s told that a naughty little kid lurks within her. She takes that as a high compliment. Her books include Too Purpley!, Too Pickley!, Too Princessy!, Light Up the Night, and her latest book, Time Out for Monsters! She writes from her home in Colorado. You can visit her website jeanreidy.com

Why Picture Books Are Important by Don Tate
If a picture is worth a thousand words, picture this: My 2-year-old son and I curled up on a chair. He sits on my lap as we read the picture book, CHUGGA-CHUGGA CHOO-CHOO by Kevin Lewis and Daniel Kirk. “Sun’s up! Morning’s here. Up and at ‘em, engineer. Chugga-chugga choo-choo, whistle blowing, whoooooooo! whooooooooo!” I roar the engine sound to my son’s delight. He roars back. “Whoooooooo! whooooooooo!”

Picture books are important.

About Don Tate
Don Tate is an award-winning illustrator of numerous award-winning books for children, including Duke Ellington’s Nutcracker Suite (Charlesbridge), She Loved Baseball (HarperCollins), and Ron’s Big Mission (Penguin). It Jes’ Happened: When Bill Traylor Started to Draw marks Don’s debut as an author. Don lives in Austin, Texas, with his wife and son. He enjoys visiting schools wherein he talks with children about his books and art, and how he became a published author. Visit his website at dontate.com

Why Picture Books Are Important by E.B. Lewis
Children’s books are essential for for pre-learning and developing skills of imagination and creativity. These skills are fundamental for cognitive and tactile growth in a world where the art of thinking has somehow taken a back seat to “edutainment.”

Picture books especially engage children to create a world of countless experiences and possibilities. For many it is the first time they are exposed to visual art and the written language. Cultural literacy and appreciation begins when a child opens a book.

In essence, a picture book is an incredible tool for empowering young minds and setting them on the path of becoming critical thinkers and lifelong learners.

E.B. Lewis

About E.B. Lewis
E. B. Lewis has illustrated more than fifty picture books, including Coretta Scott King Illustrator Award winner Talkin’ About Bessie (by Nikki Grimes) and Caldecott Honor winner Coming On Home Soon (by Jacqueline Woodson). He is the illustrator of Each Kindness, a new picture book about the importance of kindness written by Jacqueline Woodson (Nancy Paulsen Books; October 2, 2012). He taught art in public schools for twelve years, and currently teaches at the University of Arts in Philadelphia. He lives in Folsom, New Jersey.

Why Picture Books Are Important by Sean Qualls
I’m not sure when I first read Ezra Jack Keats’ A Snowy Day or John Steptoe’s Stevie. I’m not sure that I even read them as a child or that they were read to me…maybe I only saw the pictures. But as an adult, parent, and illustrator of children’s literature, these books and others like Evaline Ness’ Sam, Bangs & Moonshine or Lucille Clifton’s Everett Anderson never cease to remind me of the importance of picture books and the work that I do.

Yes, picture books are important. In a world heavy with mobile devices, social media and an insane deluge of apps and products promising us an easier/better life, picture books afford a much needed opportunity for parent and child to bond, share, and learn together. They give rise to and validate the grand imaginings of our pint size population.

For children, picture books provide a window onto the world; a way for them to delve into an array of situations, cultures and histories, to explore shapes, forms, line and color juxtaposed with words. Picture books give a child a sense of who they are in the world and who they may become.

Just like the children who read them, by their very nature, picture books are important and a world without them is not worth imagining.

Sean Qualls

About Sean Qualls
Sean Qualls is an award winning, Brooklyn-based, children’s book illustrator, artist and author. He has illustrated a number of celebrated books for children, including Giant Steps to Change The World by Spike Lee and Tonya Lewis-Lee, Little Cloud and Lady Wind by Toni Morrison and her son Slade and Before John Was a Jazz Giant, for which he received a Coretta Scott King Illustration Honor. Sean also created the art for Dizzy by Jonah Winter and most recently Freedom Song (The Story of Henry “Box” Brown) by Sally Walker. His work has received two Blue Ribbon citations from the Bulletin of the Center for Children’s Books where he was also cited for his “serious craftsmanship” and an “original style.” He lives and works in a small house in Brooklyn with his wife Selina Alko and their two children Ginger and Isaiah.

Why Picture Books are Important by Adam Rex
I would consider the importance of picture books to be self-evident if it weren’t for the constant keening of an industry lamenting their premature death. I like to imagine picture books hiding up in the rafters at their own funeral, enjoying all the nice things folks are saying about them, before leaping down and revealing that look–picture books have been just fine all along. Then picture books would trick YA into whitewashing a fence maybe.

But, because it seems to need saying: picture books are important because people of every age deserve a medium whose primary aim is not to educate, or cajole, or sermonize; but rather to connect, to touch and effect, and even to entertain. For the youngest readers they’re windows, if you can forgive that, through which the child can explore beyond himself in a shared space with a caregiver. To older children they’re like soul food; a course of their own that’s nourishing and warm and entirely apart from the roughage of more pedantically challenging fare.

Kids deserve a medium that makes them feel seen and understood. But which might also make them feel more than they understand.

Adam Rex

About Adam Rex
Adam Rex grew up in Phoenix, Arizona, the middle of three children. He was neither the smart one (older brother) or the cute one (younger sister), but he was the one who could draw. Later he got a BFA from the University of Arizona, and met his physicist wife Marie (who is both the smart and cute one). Adam and Marie live in Tucson, where Adam draws, paints, writes, spends too much time on the Internet, and listens to public radio. His picture book Frankenstein Makes A Sandwich, a collection of stories about monsters and their problems, was a New York Times Bestseller. 2007 saw the release of his first novel, The True Meaning Of Smekday, which will become a major motion picture in 2014. His latest novel is Unlucky Charms, part two of the Cold Cereal Saga. He also has a new picture called Chu’s Day, written by Neil Gaiman. Garlic and crosses are useless against Adam. Sunlight has been shown to be at least moderately effective. A silver bullet does the trick. Pretty much any bullet, really.