Narratives are powerful: stories, in their varied forms, have long been a means to entertain, educate, share information, and explore cultural values. It is through narrative that we can interpret the world around us. At times, that world is disconcerting, suggesting the need for stories that explore challenges. This study aims to generate understandings of how young children, and their teachers, perceive and respond to ‘challenging’ fictional picturebooks. We use the phrase ‘challenging picturebooks’ to refer to texts dealing with troublesome or unnerving topics, such as loss or violence (Farrar et al., 2022). Extant research notes a preponderance of challenging picturebooks (Evans, 2015) and how these texts provide ‘a way in’ to challenging issues (Crawford et al., 2019, 2024; Farrar et al., 2024; Gültekin et al., 2024). Yet, studies highlight some teachers’ reluctance to use challenging texts, wanting to protect children from troublesome topics (Bintz & Ciercierski, 2021; Crawford et al., 2019; Parker et al., 2024). In contrast to such concerns, Sendak suggested “children are willing to deal with dubious subjects” (Lanes, 1979). There is limited research that has looked at the perspectives and responses of Reception aged-children and, in particular, young children’s imaginative, play-based responses to challenging picturebooks. This relative absence is intriguing as research has touched on young children’s reactions to sadder narrative moments (Paley, 1990; Sipe & McGuire, 2006) and their use of play to explore and share understandings of texts (Flint, 2020; Flint & Adams, 2018; Rowe, 1998), hinting that there is much to explore in this area. This study will use play-based, approaches to generate novel insights into how young children’s understandings of challenging picturebooks unfold. Plus, exploration of teachers’ engagement with challenging texts will prompt considerations of how to use such picturebooks with the youngest cohort of children in school. These insights will contribute towards nuanced understandings capable of informing literacy and play-based pedagogy and practice.

‘The project team are Samantha Jayne Hulston, Lucy Rodriguez-Leon and Sara Stanley. For more information about the project please email samantha.hulston@open.ac.uk‘. 

Illustration ©2024 Viviane Schwarz, from One-Button and the Sea written by Sara Stanley, published by Scallywag Press Ltd., London