Building Early Literacy Skills
You can also use LGBTQ+ picture books to meet early childhood literacy standards.
Click on the tabs below to find out how.
If you work with infants:
Illinois Early Learning Guidelines for Birth to Three Standard:
Demonstrate interest in and comprehension of printed materials.
Encourage the children to explore in these ways:
- Look and point at pictures
- Grasp and explore books with a range of senses
- Make repeated sounds while exploring books
- Attempt to turn pages
Use these teaching strategies:
- Introduce books based upon context (e.g., quiet and relaxing books before nap time)
- Narrate as the children explore and notice pictures and details
- Point to and label
- Use basic signs and gestures for children who need them
- Model and name facial expressions and emotions
If you work with toddlers and two-year-olds:
Illinois Early Learning Guidelines for Birth to Three Standard:
Demonstrate interest in and comprehension of printed materials.
Encourage the children to explore in these ways:
- Point and react to pictures
- Attempt to name familiar pictures
- Imitate sounds and gestures in stories
- Notice more details and engages in back-and-forth communication about what’s on the page
Use these teaching strategies:
- Follow the children’s lead as they switch books or repeatedly explore a book many times
- Emphasize repeated phrases and familiar words and encourage the child to respond
- Use many labels that are familiar to the child, or in the language spoken at home
If you work with children ages 3–4 in preschool:
Illinois Early Learning and Development Standards
Encourage the children to explore in these ways:
- Look at books throughout the day, including independently (2.A.ECa)
- Comment on what they read (2.A.ECa)
- Openly discuss pictures, the appearance of characters, etc. (2.D.ECa)
- Ask and answer questions about stories and their illustrations (2.A.ECa)
- Incorporate pretend play, such as related props or reading to a doll (2.A.ECa)
- Point to and name familiar letters (4.B.ECb)
Use these teaching strategies:
- Make time to share books as children begin to request them (2.A.ECa)
- Demonstrate how to hold books with text in the correct orientation (2.C.ECb)
- Share a variety of types of texts with diverse representation
- Encourage the children to participate in pattern making and predictable text (2.A.ECa)
- Help children identify similarities and differences between books (2.D.ECb)
- Encourage questioning about nonfiction books (3.A.ECa)
- Support children in understanding the organization and basic features of print (4.A.ECa-f)
If you work with children ages 4–5 in preschool:
Illinois Early Learning and Development Standards
Encourage the children to explore in these ways:
- Talk about the feelings of the characters (2.B.ECa)
- Make predictions about what might happen next (2.B.ECa)
- Incorporate themes and events from books into play in other contexts (2.A.ECa)
- Make explicit personal connections between stories and their everyday lives (2.D.ECa)
- Point to and name upper and lower case letters (4.B.ECb)
- Identify familiar words (4.D.ECa)
Use these teaching strategies:
- Practice retelling stories with props (2.B.ECb)
- Support children in conversations about important facts in books (3.A.ECb)
- Identify and talk about the main characters in a book (2.B.ECc)
- Compare and contrast books in conversations with the children (2.D.ECb. 3.B.ECa)
- Support the children in understanding the organization and basic features of print (4.A.ECa-f)
- Encourage the children to recognize the types and features of a variety of letters (4.B.ECb)
- Explain rhyming and assist the children in identifying rhyming words (4.C.ECb)