Elementary Students’ Analytical Responses About David Wiesner’s The Three Pigs

ABSTRACT During a classroom-based study conducted in two Grade 4 classrooms, the students were provided with multiple opportunities to develop their visual meaning-making skills and competencies. The eight- and nine-year-old students’ participation in the case study research included the reading and discussing of and writing about picturebooks. The intentionally-designed instruction during the study included a variety of activities that focused on a selection of elements of visual art and design in picturebooks. The content analysis of the students’ responses to David Wiesner’s The Three Pigs revealed how learning about the what, why and how of the mode of image affected their aesthetic understanding of and critical thinking about the picturebook. Discussion of the findings is situated in Sipe’s (“Storytime”) theoretical model of literary understanding and sociocultural theory.