How to Imagine a Picture Book World • By Natascha Biebow

The World’s A Wonderful Place If You Can Only Visualize It!

When children are young, their actual world is relatively
small and they are just beginning to grasp what the wider world looks like. Day-to-day
revolves around home, routines, family, the neighbourhood, nursery and
preschool, and everyday tasks and celebrations. Yet young children have vivid imaginations
with almost unlimited scope. From just under a year, their pretend play takes
off and they soon start to play with props and people around them as if they
were real. 

 

         

Enriched pretend play helps young children develop empathy
and social skills, learn new concepts, gain confidence and independence, understand
how the world works, and improve motor skills.

 

When children see the possiblities in books, this can both
validate their imaginative play and serve as a springboard for new ideas.

 

In picture books, writers and illustrators can do just about
anything as long as the internal logic is sound.

 

Pairing seemingly random characters and objects together create such interesting, fun and compelling worlds.

 

A bucket portal into an ocean world? Yes!

 

From Billy’s Bucket by Kes Gray and Garry Parsons

 

Or even a bucket that is full of dinosaurs – didn’t
you know?

 

From Harry and the Bucketful of Dinosaurs Go to School by Ian Whybrow and Adrian Reynolds

Dragons that wear underpants. Of course!

 

 

From Dragons Love Underpants by Claire Friendman and Ben Cort

A Tiger who drinks all the water in the tap – certainly.

 

From The Tiger Who Came to Tea by Judith Kerr

A dragon who scarfs tacos?

 

 

From Dragons Love Tacos by Adam Rubin

A generous witch with room for everyone on her broom . . .

 

From Room on the Broom by Julia Donaldson and Axel Sheffler

 

A boy who can sail alone to the land of the monsters and be King . . .

From Where the Wild Things Are by Maurice Sendak

 

A seed who is bad (but doesn’t mean to be)?

 

From The Bad Seed by Jory John and Pete Oswold

Cows that type and Ducks that negotiate. . .

 

From Click, Clack, Moo, Cows That Type by Doreen Cronin and Betsy Lewin

 

Crayons that rebel . . .

 

From The Day the Crayons Quit by Drew Daywalt

 

A pigeon who wants to drive a bus . . .?

 

From Don’t Let the Pigeon Drive the Bus! by Mo Willems

 

A snowdog that can fly! 

From the Snowman and the Snowdog based on the characters created by Raymond Briggs

EVERYTHING is possible!

 

Imaginative play is empowering and fun. And it’s a great
excuse to just PLAY.

 

What book world will you create? Where will you go and who will be there?

 

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  Natascha is the author of the award-winning The Crayon Man: The True Story of the Invention of Crayola Crayons,
illustrated by Steven Salerno, winner of the Irma Black Award for
Excellence in Children’s Books, and selected as a best STEM Book 2020.
Editor of numerous prize-winning books, she runs
Blue Elephant Storyshaping,
an editing, coaching and mentoring service aimed at empowering
writers and illustrators to fine-tune their work pre-submission, and is
the Editorial Director for Five Quills. Find out about her picture book webinar courses! She is Co-Regional
Advisor (Co-Chair) of SCBWI British Isles and was awarded an MBE for her services to children’s book writers and illustrators. Find her at www.nataschabiebow.com