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For many parents, bedtime stories are a comforting routine and an opportunity to build early literacy skills. But according to new research by William Paterson University philosophy professor Laura T. Di Summa, reading picture books with young children is also a shared aesthetic experience—one that shapes how children first encounter stories, images, and imagination.
In a new paper published in the British Journal of Aesthetics, Di Summa explores the philosophical significance of reading picture books with young children. Her article, “Who’s Reading? On Children’s Aesthetics and Parenting,” examines how shared reading introduces children to artistic expression while also reshaping how parents experience stories alongside them.
While the benefits of reading to children – from vocabulary development to early literacy –are widely recognized, Di Summa argues that the activity also has a deeper philosophical dimension. Reading together invites children into their earliest encounters with aesthetic experience: images, sounds, narrative voices, and imagination.
Reading with, not simply to, children
Di Summa suggests that reading with young children differs fundamentally from the way adults typically read books. Instead of a quiet, solitary activity, reading aloud becomes interactive and unpredictable. Parents change their voices for different characters, repeat favorite passages, and pause frequently as children ask questions or focus on unexpected details in the illustrations.
Children, she notes, do not always approach books as linear narratives moving from beginning to end. Instead, they often treat a book as a rich world of images and voices to explore.
As Di Summa describes in the paper, a child may interrupt the reading of a story to ask about a seemingly minor detail: “My toddler stops me to ask me what a little butterfly in the bottom right corner of the page (largely insignificant to the story) has to say.”
Moments like these reveal that children are not simply listening to a story but actively exploring the imaginative world of the book. Their attention may shift between characters, illustrations, sounds, and questions about what is happening on the page.
Picture books therefore play an important role in children’s earliest encounters with artistic expression. Through illustrations, color, rhythm, and narrative voice, children begin engaging with ideas about representation, imagination, and meaning: questions that lie at the heart of philosophical discussions about art and aesthetics.
Learning from children’s curiosity
Di Summa also argues that these shared reading moments can reshape the experience for adults. Because children respond to books in unexpected ways –focusing on small details, inventing interpretations, or asking surprising questions – reading together can become a process of discovery for parents as well.
Rather than simply teaching children how stories work, parents may find themselves learning how their child sees the world: what captures their attention, what makes them laugh, and what sparks their curiosity.
By entering a story together – pausing, performing, and wondering about what appears on the page – parents and children participate in a shared aesthetic experience that shapes how both come to understand stories, art, and imagination.
Ultimately, over time, these moments of shared exploration transcend understanding about philosophy and the world; they help deepen the emotional connection between parent and child, and their understanding of one another. As Di Summa writes, “Reading together can, in this sense, be viewed as an essential conduit for parental love.”
