Don't teach in your picture book. Do not preach. Do not talk down to the reader. Kids are lectured and told what to do all day every day, and they feel disempowered. So, the strongest possible way to get a message across is to have a child go through something, learn something, practice something, maybe even teach something to somebody else, without actually coming out and directly saying the words.

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transcript for picture book lessons

Hello, this is Mary Kole with Good Story Company. And today, I am talking about picture book lessons. This is going to be a very short video.

Don't teach in your picture book. Do not say out loud any lessons or morals. Do not preach. Do not talk down to the reader. These seem like very, very simple tips but you would not believe the number of picture books that I see that have the morals, the lesson, the premise, whatever, the theme, stated outright in the manuscript.

So, a lot of people are very interested in the climate crisis and sort of doing their job to mitigate the climate crisis in their fiction. So, I'm seeing a ton of manuscripts right now, for example, that deal with, you know, don't litter your plastic or don't use plastic just once and throw it away. These kind of lesson, right? Because it's something that is within reach for a kid to do, they can learn this lesson. They can internalize the lesson. They can make a small modification to their behavior, and it is going to potentially have some kind of impact on a problem that we are all facing. And a lot of writers really feel passionate about, kind of, helping to solve that problem, doing their part. So instead of actually explaining, like do not use single-use plastic or reuse everything and don't use plastic, we want to show a character sort of going through a process where they learn about the problem and then they change their behavior. But nobody is talking down to that character. And that character is also not turning into a mini adult and talking to the reader and saying, "Gosh, I learned that not to use ..." you know.

So, if you think about it, kids are lectured and told what to do all day every day by their parents, by older siblings, by religious leaders, by teachers. Everybody in their lives tells them what to do and they feel disempowered. And so, the strongest possible way to get a message across is to have a child go through something, learn something, practice something, maybe even teach something to somebody else, like a classmate or younger sibling, without actually coming out and directly saying the words. This also, especially, goes for, sort of, the meaning of the heart of the picture book, which is it's good to share or everyone is different and that's okay. We see a lot of picture books with some of this positive messaging because a lot of people have sort of understood the value of love and kindness in our world and they want to pass that on to the new generation. But these kind of emotional core, heart messages are especially something to avoid stating outright because they will seem like a preachy, didactic bit of text that lies limply on the page to those young readers. And so, instead of saying, "Gosh, kindness is so great," you want to see a character, you want to show a character acting with kindness. You want to see the people around them blossoming as a result of this kindness, and you really want to get that message home without ever saying the message.

And so, for all of you picture book writers out there, even if it's a religious book with a religious message, if it is a secular book with a secular message, whatever the case may be, whatever the exception may be where you think that it's gonna be okay for you to just put that message in the text, I urge you and really challenge you to wherever your theme is stated, wherever the takeaway is stated, take that out of your manuscript and instead, create it in the reader's mind through the character, through the character being proactive, through the character moving through the story and experiencing your theme or your takeaway, and then showing the result of that experience in the story itself. If it is a book with a tie-in to a nonfiction issue, for example, pollution, plastic, climate change, you can put a for parents' and teachers' resource in the back, an author note in the back, where you can be a little bit more explanatory and didactic. That is always available to you. But for the narrative part of the story, I urge you, if your takeaway currently features in your picture book manuscript, take it out, and instead, do the hard work to create it in your reader's mind without the words on the page. That is a number one priority for all of my picture book writers that I feel very strongly about, because the second your manuscript is labeled didactic, it is going to be much less appealing to agents, to publishers, and if you really think about it, to those kids and those families on the receiving end of the story.

This is Mary Kole with Good Story Company and here's to a good, subtle story.

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