Today’s post wraps up a series on using comics and graphic novels in the classroom.

‘A Comic Book Club’

Deimosa Webber-Bey, MS.Ed., MS.LIS., is the director of information services and cultural insight at the Scholastic Corporate Library & Archive:

For a decade, comics and graphic novels were an anchor in my educational pedagogy. They were omnipresent, including posters, lessons, clubs, and the classroom library, introducing my students to the joy and power of engaging with sequential art as a medium for information and story.

For starters, I bat-signaled my love for sequential art by hanging posters behind my desk. This was an uncomplicated way to assert comics as “real” literature in the educational space; mine was a classroom where references to superhero mythology were fair game for text-to-text connections, metaphors, and logical reasoning as we discussed classic tomes from Shakespeare to Achebe.

Rather, these comparisons were welcome! Beyond visuals, having comics in my library collection was a formal endorsement and a cost saver. In my current field—librarianship—youth librarians know well how heavily they circulate in comparison to prose. Investing in hardcover graphic novels and character encyclopedias meant having books in my collection that barely sat on the shelves.

Another angle that was simple to execute was forming a comic book club. Eventually, the kids and I were meeting during lunch TWICE a week—the conversations were that important to us. We moved from informal chats to formal debates within a matter of months, building a “March Madness” bracket with 64 characters that “battled” for months as we argued who could overwhelm who and got down to a decisive battle of good vs. evil. (To answer your unspoken question, Dr. Manhattan won almost all of the time.)

Finally, I used comics in my lessons primarily for analysis. After viewing the film version of a novel, the students analyzed the film by drawing a three-panel comic strip to process the scene in the film that resonated the most for them. Another time, echoing 24-Hour Comic Book Day (where you draw 24 pages in 24 hours), we did a 6-Hour Comic Book Day where kids signed trip slips to sit in the library with me spending the day creating their own comic.

Sequential art is a medium of expression that reinforces reading-comprehension skills beyond decoding and including them in lessons, and the library takes away the intimidation of pure text for striving readers. Skills that I was able to teach with them include making inferences, predicting, activating prior knowledge, retelling, visualizing, sequencing, and summarizing the main idea.

Data from the 8th edition of the Kids & Family Reading Report show that graphic novels and comic books are among the top formats kids want to read. And looking at this data even closer, it is important to note that the number of kids saying they want to read graphic novels has increased 15 percentage points since they were last surveyed in 2018!

To instill a lifelong love of literature, I tried to give my students exceptional stories in all the formats that resonated with me on my own journey as a reader. In the library field, they say that you should only book talk something that you have read and that you have loved, so if there was ever a comic strip in the newspaper that you enjoyed or if your parents said yes when you asked for Archie at the supermarket—share that with your students. There is power in that story.

‘Inspiring a Love for Reading’

Kasey Short is the middle school director of studies and English teacher at Charlotte Country Day School in North Carolina:

Graphic novels are perfect for encouraging students to read, teaching nonfiction text structure, gaining multiple perspectives, and gaining additional insight into classics.
Most of my middle school students enjoy reading graphic novels and often choose them for their independent reading.

I consistently read and recommend graphic novels to my students and enjoy it if they recommend one to me. I can quickly read it, and we can share our thoughts about the book. I try to have a variety of graphic novels in my classroom library for students to choose from and show them that graphic novels come in all genres and levels of complexity. Some favorites include New Kid by Jerry Craft, Swim Team by Johnnie Christmas, Global by Eoin Colfer, Heartstopper by Alice Oseman, Salt Magic by Hope Larson, and Spinning by Tillie Walden.

Nonfiction graphic novels are perfect for teaching students how to navigate nonfiction text structure and increase interest in nonfiction texts. When reading graphic novels, like many nonfiction books, it is essential to read the images. Students often skip over images, graphics, and maps in their textbooks, and graphic novels serve as practice in reading graphics and examining how the graphics and words come together to create a full idea.

Asking students what they learned from the graphics that they would not have known only from the words is a great start to examine their importance. I often have them practice first reading a few pages with only looking at the words, then only looking at the graphics, and then combining them to get the full picture. There are many nonfiction graphic novels that introduce students to different topics, counter the idea that nonfiction is boring, and then inspire them to dig deeper into the topic using other texts. Recommendations include: A Fire Story by Brian Fies, In the Shadow of the Fallen Towers by Don Brown, Wake: The Hidden History of Women-Led Slave Revolts by Rebecca Hall, Brazen by Penelope Bagieu, When the Stars are Scattered by Victoria Jamieson, and the March series by John Lewis.

Since graphic novels can be read at a quicker pace than many traditionally formatted books, students can engage with more stories in the same amount of time. This is especially great for reading graphic memoirs. By reading multiple graphic memoirs, students gain insight into various perspectives, gain understanding, and develop empathy. Recommendations include: A First Time for Everything by Dan Santat, Sunshine: A Graphic Novel by Jarrett J. Krosoczka, Ay Mija! by Christine Suggs, Messy Roots: A Graphic Memoir of a Wuhanese-American by Laura Goa, Almost American Girl by Robin Ha, and I was Their American Dream by Malake Gharib.

Graphic novel versions of classic texts provide alternative ways for students to experience a classic story. They can be read before, alongside, or in place of the traditional book. If the goal is for students to grapple with the original complex texts, they can benefit from reading the graphic novel version before tackling a complex classic text so that they have background knowledge and context for the texts. Reading it alongside the traditional texts allows them to navigate between two and make comparisons.

If the goal is for them to be familiar with the story or examine themes, they can read the graphic novel version. Some Recommendations include Brave New World: A Graphic Novel by Fred Fordham, Anne Frank’s Diary: The Graphic Adaptation by David Polonsky and Ari Folman, Romeo and Juliet and The Odyssey by Gareth Hinds, George Orwell’s 1984 by Matyas Namai, and Bea Wolf by Zach Weinersmith.

Graphic novels are an excellent format for inspiring a love for reading, developing interests, and teaching explicit strategies.

Thanks to Deimosa and Kasey for contributing their thoughts!

Today’s post answered this question:

How do you use graphic novels or comics in your classroom?

In Part One, Tim Smyth, Jun Shen, and Kiera Beddes contributed their experiences.

Consider contributing a question to be answered in a future post. You can send one to me at lferlazzo@epe.org. When you send it in, let me know if I can use your real name if it’s selected or if you’d prefer remaining anonymous and have a pseudonym in mind.

You can also contact me on X at @Larryferlazzo or on Bluesky at @larryferlazzo.bsky.social.

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