Language learning theories support learners’ engagement in communicating and interacting to negotiate cultural boundaries through the development of respect, tolerance and empathy, as such nurturing a flexible, open-minded and critical thinker (Doyé, 1999). Well-known in ELT, the five savoirs of the Byram’s  intercultural communicative competence model (1997) develop the cognitive, the pragmatic and the affective dimensions of language learning and can foster learners’ critical reflection around their societal values, beliefs, and behaviours. However, European studies have shown that foreign language curricula tend  to give less attention to the intercultural communicative competence of language learning, and that teachers’ beliefs about language learning and unquestioned teaching routines can also hinder its successful inclusion (Sercu et al, 2005).

 

Despite the fact that picture books have been part of primary English language education for over four decades, they continue to be associated with the very youngest learner and selected for the words they contain and the restricted topics they cover e.g. colours, clothes, parts of the body. It is my intention to show that, through their pictures and words, picture books  can expose learners to a variety of ways of being, cultural differencesand what is commonly referred to as ‘otherness’, supporting first steps towards ‘combining critical literacy with intercultural learning, as an empowering process’ (Bland, 2013: 26). I will demonstrate how, when carefully selected, picture books can be amongst the most valuable of resources for intercultural and civic-related activities with primary children.