Does your child only read graphic novels? That’s OK – it’s helping them build literacy skills
- Written by Judith Ridge, Sessional academic, University of Tasmania
Some parents worry if their children only read graphic novels – or even mostly read them. A common question goes something like: how do I get my child to read something other than comics or graphic novels? But the answer might be: you don’t have to.
When a reader can successfully break the code of a text, reading in schools becomes reading to learn.
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How graphic novels help reading
Young readers often live their lives in a visual culture, where information is accessed through images, videos and moving images such as film. So, it may be counterintuitive to ask readers in classrooms to work solely through static, one-dimensional texts.
Graphic novels have the potential to build reading-to-learn skills, such as fluency and (ultimately) reading comprehension.
Graphic novels also build reader engagement, which supports reading fluency. The elaborate set of codes and conventions specific to graphic novels present the reader with a sophisticated combination of reading cues, both text-based and visual.
Graphic novels build reader engagement, which supports reading fluency.
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Narrative and meaning are created in graphic novels by a complex marriage of image, text and design elements. These include speech and thought bubbles, text or narrative boxes, sound effects (typically portrayed by dynamic visual representation of onomatopoeic words, or words that replicate sound – like the BAMs and POWs of the 1960s Batman TV show), and regular and irregular panels.
High-level decoding and comprehension skills are used to process many elements of a graphic novel. They include the portrayal of facial expressions and physical posture and gestures, the illustrators’ visual style and colour palette, the physical layout of the narrative through the use of panels, break-out images, and linear and non-linear storylines.
The support provided by these visual elements means the graphic novel is increasingly the text of choice for working with many kinds of students.
This includes students with reading difficulties and those characterised as “reluctant” readers (children who can read but choose not to, or resist reading for a range of reasons not directly associated with technical literacy). Graphic novels are also suited to children learning English as a second or additional language.
The skills needed to navigate and comprehend narrative and meaning in a graphic novel are now being recognised as essential ones, in an increasingly visually dominated world.
More than gateways
Positive attitudes towards graphic novels among students and educators is a recent development. For many decades — and still, in some quarters — graphic novels suffered from negative ideas about their literary quality and moral standing, due to their association with comic books.
Class-based prejudices against comic books spilled over to infect attitudes towards the graphic novel. For many decades, they were seen at best as mere “gateway” texts to “real” literature, or means by which to introduce classics such as Shakespeare to classrooms full of unruly and uninterested teenagers.
Class-based prejudices around comic books spilled over to infect attitudes towards the graphic novel.
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Education professor Richard Allington’s definition of fluency describes the ability to read a text quickly, accurately and with proper expression. It has often been described as the “most neglected” reading skill with calls for it to be taught more actively in reading classrooms.
A graphic novel provides a platform where a reader can interpret meaning rapidly – often without conscious attention, yet with the capacity to deeply understand the story, and become engaged or “hooked” into reading.
As Judd Winick, author of the Hilo graphic novel series for readers aged 8 to 12, has said: “ You see the words inside the balloons above the characters? You have to read them. It’s reading.”
Authors: Judith Ridge, Sessional academic, University of Tasmania 
