There is a lot, however, that threatens children's literature. Corporate America has discovered there is money to be made in children's books. We often hear that television is a threat to reading, and surely it is true, but Jim Trelease, author of The Read Aloud Handbook, recommend that we learn from the millions of dollars Madison Avenue has poured into commercial research and apply this knowledge to our introduction of books. So must we introduce a child to reading when she is at a young, receptive age. A small baby will take naturally to the rhythms of a nursery rhyme or song book.
Commercials are brief, leaving the young audience hungering for more.
Your initial reading sessions should match a limited attention span. Dubanevich's Pigs in Hiding is a book of few words but packed with actions as the bow-tied pig dashes about the house trying to find his friends. He can't, but the young reader glories in being able to do so. The colorful illustrations are brilliant and reassuring at the same time. Parents tell me again and again that choosing books to buy can be overwhelming.