Many scholars cite Orbis Pictus by Johann Comenius published in 1658 as the beginning of literature written for a child audience. This text was intended for young children learning to read. Originally written in German, it was available in English in 1659. According to Kimberly Reynolds, Orbis Pictus was a small volume that measured six by three inches and “it reveals much about the history of writing for children, not least how, long before instant communication and globalization, some children’s books rapidly moved between countries” (6). The text was bilingual, Latin and the language of the country where it was published. Comenius used a combination of illustrations and text to introduce children to all in the world. Orbis Pictus attempted to anticipate a child’s questions about their world, and grounded their world in Christian beliefs.

Battledores were parchment literacy tools that replaced the earlier hornbooks, a page of parchment protected by a thin film of horn mounted on a paddle-like surface. Hornbooks included the ABCs, numbers, and the Lord’s Prayer. Colonial American children would wear the hornbooks around their necks attached by string or a thin piece of leather, so that they could hold the paddle handle and practice their literacy skills. Battledores were more child-friendly tools. As parchment that could be folded to fit in one’s pocket, they also offered the alphabet and pronunciation key with simple illustrations.

Kate Greenaway’s illustrated A Apple Pie (1886) is included in this section as an example of a narrative alphabet book, similar to Bill Martin and John Archambault’s Chicka Chicka Boom Boom (1989), illustrated by Lois Ehlert.

Though many of the early publications for children were meant to teach either literacy or good behavior, there were some early publications for young children that offered simplified stories in the form of chapbooks that entertained the young audience. Chapbooks were inexpensive paper-bound pamphlets that contained ballads, poems, tales–quick reads–usually in forty pages or less. A True Tale of Robin Hood (18th c.) was one of many chapbooks read by children and adults alike that delivered exciting episodes in the life of a well-known folk hero.

While early educational tools focused on attaining literacy with little attention given to the child’s interests, a shift begins to take place with the creation of works such as Greenaway’s illustrated alphabet book. Later in the mid-1900s, basal readers, notably the Dick and Jane readers with limited vocabularies,  are challenged as educational literacy tools by the growing popularity of trade picture books. Dr. Seuss’s (Theodore Geisel) beginning readers are illustrative of books that engaged readers and developed generations of readers.

Reference:

Reynolds, Kimberley. Children’s Literature: A Very Short Introduction. Oxford University Press, 2011.