How to Start Writing Preschool Children's Picture Books

By Jodee Redmond

Mom and preschool child looking at a picture book

If you are wondering how to start writing preschool children's picture books, please continue reading to get some suggestions.

Tips on How to Start Writing Preschool Children's Picture Books

If you are interested in writing a picture book, the first thing you need to do is to take a good look at the existing market. If you want to change from a consumer of children's picture books to someone who produces them, you need to conduct some market research first.

Check Out the Existing Market

Visit your local library or a bookstore to get an idea of the kinds of children's books that are currently on the market. Get information about which ones are current bestsellers and study them carefully to get an idea of why they are popular.

What themes are used?
How does the author structure the story? Does he or she use rhymes or certain phrases to tell the story?
What is memorable about the characters in the book?

Find a Niche

The children's book market is already highly competitive, and it seems like just about every topic that children could be interested in has already been addressed. You don't have to reinvent the wheel, but you do need to find a different angle for your story that hasn't been written about several times already. Another strategy that can help you figure out what kind of story you want to write is to spend time with some preschoolers. See what kinds of things they are interested in. Ask them what kinds of books they like to look at and have read to them. You may also want to think about your own childhood and the kinds of books that you enjoyed at that point in your life.

Start Writing

You don't need to write your children's story all at once. If you want to become a writer, you just need to start writing. Buy a notebook to write down your thoughts. At this point, you don't need to be writing full stories, but you do need to get into the habit of writing often.

Develop Your Story and Characters

When you get an idea for a story, start working to develop it. You will want to make the characters in your story memorable in some way. When you are considering how to start writing preschool children's picture books, keep in mind that you are not limited to including only human characters in your story.

Have some fun with the characters you are creating. Are they humans who are living in this time? Are they from the past or the future? Is the character a type of animal? Is it an object of some kind that has the power to tell a story? If you are the author, you can decide exactly which characters are going to be in your story and what kinds of situations they will be in.

Spend Time Polishing Your Story

More than likely, you will need to spend some time with your story before you can even think about submitting it to a publisher. This is a normal part of the process. You may even need to put your story away for a time and come back to it later on to get a fresh perspective. It may be helpful for you to have someone else read your story and give you some feedback. Reading your story to a preschooler is a way to test-market your ideas. You will be able to gauge from the youngster's reaction whether this age group will find your story interesting or if it needs some more work before you can submit it to a publisher for consideration.