Children's Observations about the Art in Picture Books.

This report establishes a foundation of information about how children in classroom settings develop visual literacy. Data was gathered during five 45-minute sessions with a second and a fourth grade classroom during which children looked at pictures in four versions of the Noah's Ark tale. The intent was to elicit whatever children chose to say about their observations of the books, then have them choose a favorite version and justify that choice. A description of the classroom discussions during the sessions is presented, and focuses on the order in which the children chose to look at and discuss the books; picture content; artists' use of color and lines; and page layout. Six tables present data: order of presentation; order of choice; comments about pictures for both grade 2 and grade 4; and comments about text for both grades. Some childrens' comments are provided to illustrate the range of their concerns. It was discovered, when verbal class discussions and written descriptions about their final picture choice were compared, that the written products were far less skilled than the discussion, implying that a more effective way to capture the thoughts of the children fully would have been to tape record their comments. Contains 13 references. (MAS)