CATS!

Little readers learn about cats.

All sorts of cats are on display in this board book. The text employs dialogic reading, an interactive practice wherein little ones are encouraged to answer questions the book poses and apply these interactions to their real lives. “What were they doing?” the text asks in reference to cats seen in a preceding spread. “Napping? / Purring? / Rooarrring?” Individual readers’ enjoyment may vary, and caregivers might find themselves straining to supply the missing words in the introductory picture of a cat napping in a lap, captioned “Lap ____. Cat ____.” The illustrations are sweet, however. Feline friends are presented in all shapes and colors, mostly house cats, but a tiger appears a couple of times and the last pages of the board book include a lion and a leopard. The critters are displayed against warm purple, green, and blue backgrounds, making the white, yellow, and orange cats pop all the more. Although the exercise feels a little forced, it does provide caregivers with a model for practicing dialogic reading when sharing other books with their little ones.

Despite the title, cats are not the main event in this book, but they help the lesson go down.