Picturebooks are highly sophisticated multimodal ensembles. Understanding the semiotic resources and affordances of the visual mode to represent and communicate meaning is fundamental to appreciating the artistry and complexity of picturebooks. A recent classroom-based research project with grade 2 students featured explicit instruction on particular elements of visual art and design to develop and enhance students' visual competences and aesthetic appreciation and understanding of picturebooks. In addition to being provided with multiple opportunities to talk and write about picturebook artwork, the students created their own multimodal print texts. The students' composition of this multimodal work required them to intentionally apply the focus elements of visual art and design featured during the study. Examples of students' writing, talking, and artwork reveal how they remade meaning across modes as they described, explained, interpreted, and analyzed visual images in both the picturebooks and their own multimodal texts.