The animals in this story are treated as though they are all human and have human qualities. They can all speak; ‘”What can we do?” Cried Badger’, this gives them a voice straight away which means they have to have a personality, which is slowly developed for the child, to show how the different animals all have different personalities and ways of thinking. This can illustrate to the child, the diversity of peoples personalities in real life and maybe help them deal with different people differently. They each have a unique identity, which the child may come to be aware of and then maybe develop a ‘favourite character’ or a particular character they can relate to. For example, ‘Fox was clever and he was the strongest and bravest of them all,’ this shows the child the individual personality of Fox.
The book is fictitious, this allows the child to escape to a different world, in this case, one where animals can talk to each other and go on adventures to escape evil. This helps the reader engage in literary worlds, thus helping to develop the imagination of a child. This story also provides the child with new perspectives and experiences, this helps to broaden their mind.
The text is broken down into separate sections, to reduce large sections of text being together, making it harder for the child to read. The text is separated into different paragraphs, giving the child more chance to finish reading a section of the text, then go onto the next. The text is also separated by pictures in some cases. The illustrations are not just in one place on the page, they are dispersed all over the page, wrapped round sections of texts, underneath and on top of the text – giving the child different places to focus on, on the page, which makes it more interesting for the child to look at and read. The pictures are large and clearly depict what is going on. Each animal is illustrated accurately to give the child a picture of what the animal looks like – they aren’t drawn in a cartoon style, but a more realistic style. The graphology helps the child to learn how to read more easily by providing them with the pictures, which can easily be related to the text, improving their understanding of events and the story.
The text is written to be interactive with the child. The text is simple, so it can be elaborated to a child, by a parent or caregiver when reading the story to them. They can point to the pictures and identify which animal is which and learn what the different animals look like and what their names are. The discourse between the text and the child, is written in a way, for example ‘The animals’ homes were being destroyed to make way for houses and roads’, to inform the child or reader of the book the story. The narration is direct, aimed directly at the reader. The speech of the animals is less direct, as they are talking to each other, not directly to the reader yet they can still follow what is being said, who is saying it and what is happening.
The lexical choices in the story are used for informative and educational purposes in some cases. The constant use of the animals names ‘Fox’ and ‘Badger’, teaches the child the names of the different animals, which the pictures then show the child what the animals’ looks like. It also teaches to differentiate between species of animals. ‘Animals’ is used as the collective term for all the animals and then the names ‘adder’, ‘weasel’ are used for the specific species they are referring to. This can help the child, maybe if they still over extend and have learning difficulties, to get rid of over extension. The lexis used is very simple, ‘houses’, ‘roads’, ‘wood’. They are mostly concrete nouns, which, in a child’s case, are the easiest to understand and grasp. New lexis, which a child may not have come across before, such as ‘set’ (referring to Badgers home), is introduced. ‘”We can meet in my set”, said Badger’, because Badger is referring to the set as ‘my’, which is a possessive pronoun, the child can then relate the word ‘set’ to a badger, and by interacting with a caregiver, who will probably explain what a ‘set’ is, they will then learn that it is in fact, the name of a badgers home.
The writing in a child’s book introduces children to the structure of sentences, and at this stage, mainly simple sentences. This is a key function in their development and understanding of language, as it helps them to communicate with others effectively. Children’s books are very important in establishing this; by providing the child with new words, the evidence of different sentence structures, spellings of words and different concepts and morals.
The grammatical elements in this story, suit the audience and context it is written in. Firstly, there are lots of repeated words, ‘fox’, ‘badger’, ‘animals’, ‘wood’, ‘pond’, these are constantly relating back to the subject of the story and the characters, reminding the child of what is going on and who the characters are. This helps them follow the story easily. Repeated structures are used in parts of the text, particularly after any speech in the story, ‘”What can we do” cried Badger’, ‘”Where have you been?” cried Badger’. There is a constant use of ‘cried’ and ‘said’ after a character has spoke in the story, this illustrates to the child who has said what and, more importantly, how they have said it. The child may then begin to understand the different uses of (possible) intonation in the characters voices to show their feelings about something. They are quite emotive verbs.
The epithet ‘White Deer Park’ is a metaphor. Instead of using ‘Nature Reserve’, the animals call it a more familiar name – to do with other animals in the actual park. The adjective is used as a metaphor. This gives a more imaginative slant on the story and helps the child develop their imagination
There is usage of simple sentence structures, they can clarify to the child, what is happening, who it’s happening to and so on; ‘We will have a meeting’.
The adjective usage in the story helps elaborate, for the child on elements of the sentence, ‘Weasel and Adder made a solemn promise’, ‘I’ve been on a long journey’. It just gives them a better idea of an element of the story. The use of pronouns is common. As a child has already developed their knowledge of pronouns well by this stage (age 5 to 7), then there will be common usage of pronouns to feed their knowledge. The verbs used are quite common, simple verbs; ‘to cut’, ‘to call’, ‘live’, ‘carry’ etc. There are a few irregular verbs, such as; ‘said’ and ‘flew’, but the child may already have some knowledge about these and already understand them.
The main focus in the story is on the plot – there is no ‘filling’ text in which a deeper explanation into the feelings or thoughts of the animals is written down. This would complicate the story for the child and they could lose track of the plot.
The different paragraphs are clearly defined by going into a completely different subject; ‘That night…’, ‘The next night…’, it helps separate the different times and becomes more clear for the child to determine what is happening in the story.
Conjunctions are used ‘one day men came with machines to cut down the trees and dig up the earth’. The ‘and’ is an additive structure, used to bring to ideas together in one sentence, this is a simple way of introducing this idea of conveying two different ideas in one sentence to a child. By doing this, they are being introduced to compound sentences. These are more complex form of sentence than a simple sentence, and are common in the story. As it is a more advanced child’s book, rather than a picture book, it is going to contain longer sentence structures. This eases children gently into more complex syntax structures.
Along with these more complex structures, clauses are used too ‘soon there would be no wood left’, to get a simpler idea across clearly to the child.
In one part, listing is used to introduce the child to animal names; ‘Rabbits, hares and hedgehogs, mice, voles and squirrels joined Fox and Badger’. This gets a lot of information over to the child in a simpler way than putting it into a sentence or sentences. There are fewer words, as commas are used to separate the words. This is showing the child that words aren’t always necessary to separate words, symbols can be used in place of the words and still be understandable.
This book has used common ways of writing for children, making it appeal to a child. By including illustrations it helps form the child’s understanding of events in the book and relates the pictures to the words. The main theme and plot of the story is fictional and involves animals talking to each other and going on an adventure. This is beyond reality and really appeals to a child’s mind and helps further develop their imagination. This makes a child’s reading experience more interactive and more enjoyable for them.