Digital children’s literature in the interplay between visuality and animation

Abstract

Due to digitization, children’s literature has changed enormously. Digital media such as tablets or smartphones expand children’s access to literature decisively. Particularly, picture book apps have become increasingly popular with parents and children. However, besides the unclear research situation on the effectiveness of picture book apps on early literacy development, there is a lack of theoretically and empirically based quality criteria legitimizing the use of digital children’s literature in early childhood education. Thus, in this chapter, a theoretical model to analyze picture book apps and their potential for story comprehension is suggested. Using the app Sweet dreams, Howie Hare as an analytical example, it is demonstrated how this model can be adopted, and how qualitative criteria for practice can be derived from it. A particular potential in narrative animations, which are linked to the narrative level of the picture book and which are not distracting from the storyline, is assumed. Moreover, the distinction between narrative and illustrative animations is discussed.