Color Zoo

Author Lois Ehlert

Publisher Harper Collins

ISBN 0-694-01067-7

            Color Zoo by Lois Ehlert is a wonderful picture book with good picture to text match. What I love most about this book is the way it was designed. Each page has a picture of an animal made out of layered geometrical shapes with the name of the animal under the picture.  On the first page, there is a tiger’s face made out of several shapes and vibrant colors.  The pages are a series of stacked cut outs, so when you turn the first page, the tiger becomes a mouse and there is a circle on the back of the previous page.  Children can see how the shapes are used to configure the animals in the story. When you turn the next page, the cut out square is on one side, and the next animal, the fox, is on the other side.  Children will enjoy reading this book and naming the new animal on each page as well as naming the shapes in the story.  If you are worried about the cut outs on the page getting ripped while children read this book, it is also available as a board book. 

This is a great interactive book.  When you read aloud to your students, you can have them tell you the names of the nine animals, nine shapes and sixteen colors used in the story.  After reading this book to my students, I would follow up by doing an art activity. I would have them make their own animals out of shapes and have the class make their own color zoo.  What a cute idea for a bulletin board.  I love the fact that Lois Ehlert did not just use the shapes that most children are familiar with, such as the circle and square. They have a hexagon and an octagon which I find my Pre-K students mistake for a rectangle.  This book can be paired with another book by Ehlert, Color Farm, which is done in the same fashion.  Color Zoo won the 1990 Caldecott Honor for best illustration in a children’s book.

Kitten's First Full Moon

Author Kevin Henkes

Publisher Greenwillow Books

ISBN 0-06-058828-4

Kitten’s First Full Moon by Kevin Henkes is a wonderful children’s book about a cute kitten that sees a full moon for the first time and thinks there is a little bowl of milk in the sky.  The kitten tries everything she can to get to this bowl of milk, but the little bowl of milk is still up in the sky, waiting for her.  Her attempts leave her tired, wet, and hungry.  When the kitten finally gives up chasing the moon for what she thinks is milk, she goes home to find a great big bowl of milk waiting for her on the porch.  Looks like kittens luck has changed as she falls sleep after drinking her milk under the moonlight. 

            This book was an easy pick for me because I am a cat lover. The kitten in the story is so cute in her attempts to get to what she believes is a bowl of milk.  What caught my eye was the cover of the book and the fact that the cover is in black and white.  I have not read many children’s books that were done completely in black and white, normally your are drawn to books which have drawings done in vibrant colors.  The illustrations in Kitten’s First Full Moon are detailed drawings done in shades of black and gray.  Do not let that discourage you from reading this book.  It still has wonderful illustrations that give you a feeling that you are out in the dark, at night, with this persistent kitten in her quest for milk.

            Repetitive phrases make this an excellent book for a read aloud as the narrator repeats, “Still, there was the little bowl of milk, just waiting.”  Pre-school children will find humor in the story when the kitten tries to lick the bowl of milk only to get bugs on her tongue. In the end, children will clap when the kitten returns home and finds a bowl of milk on the porch waiting for her.

            This is the first book I read by Kevin Henkes who has published many other books including Chrysanthemum. After reading this book, I am interested in reading more books by this author. I recommend that you follow this story with Frank Asch’s Happy Birthday, Moon, a story about a bear that mistakes his echo for the voice of the moon. Kitten’s First Full Moon won The Caldecott Medal in 2005.