This heartening, well-crafted story refreshingly places its emphasis on its protagonist’s resilience.
Based on a true refugee story, this deep and hopeful book sports colorful, simplified shapes depicting students and their teacher.
Stein does not attempt realistic depictions. The children look like jelly beans with limbs, facial features, and hair, and their all-blue teacher is only very slightly more detailed; all are digitally collaged over black-and-white photos of a Western classroom. This surprisingly effective choice allows readers to concentrate on the characters’ emotions. One day Ms. Truong asks her students to draw a memory from the places where they were born. A bike, a bowl of rice, children running through tall grass—and bricks and kids with crabby faces are some of what the students draw. The children each talk about their drawings and their cultures, things they like, dislike, or miss, and the teacher offers support and consolation when needed. When it is Shahad’s turn, she says that the bricks she drew are what inflicted the scar on her face and made her leg look the way it does. Shahad’s bubbly illustration does have scars next to her eye and on her knee. As Shahad leaves the classroom that day, Ms. Truong compliments her perfectly braided hair. With continued support, Shahad eventually asks, “Do you think I’m beautiful?” “I think you are spectacularly beautiful,” the teacher responds. Beautiful Shahad grows more confident and will pleasantly surprise with similar support to others the following year. Readers will likely infer that Shahad is from Syria or Iraq.
This heartening, well-crafted story refreshingly places its emphasis on its protagonist’s resilience. (Picture book. 4-8)Pub Date: Dec. 4, 2018
ISBN: 978-1-57687-891-0
Page Count: 32
Publisher: POW!
Review Posted Online: Aug. 13, 2018
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 1, 2018
New parents of daughters will eat these up and perhaps pass on the lessons learned.
All the reasons why a daughter needs a mother.
Each spread features an adorable cartoon animal parent-child pair on the recto opposite a rhyming verse: “I’ll always support you in giving your all / in every endeavor, the big and the small, / and be there to catch you in case you should fall. / I hope you believe this is true.” A virtually identical book, Why a Daughter Needs a Dad, publishes simultaneously. Both address standing up for yourself and your values, laughing to ease troubles, being thankful, valuing friendship, persevering and dreaming big, being truthful, thinking through decisions, and being open to differences, among other topics. Though the sentiments/life lessons here and in the companion title are heartfelt and important, there are much better ways to deliver them. These books are likely to go right over children’s heads and developmental levels (especially with the rather advanced vocabulary); their parents are the more likely audience, and for them, the books provide some coaching in what kids need to hear. The two books are largely interchangeable, especially since there are so few references to mom or dad, but one spread in each book reverts to stereotype: Dad balances the two-wheeler, and mom helps with clothing and hair styles. Since the books are separate, it aids in customization for many families.
New parents of daughters will eat these up and perhaps pass on the lessons learned. (Picture book. 4-8, adult)Pub Date: May 1, 2019
ISBN: 978-1-4926-6781-0
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Sourcebooks Jabberwocky
Review Posted Online: March 16, 2019
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 1, 2019
While this is a fairly bland treatment compared to Deborah Lee Rose and Carey Armstrong-Ellis’ The Twelve Days of...
Rabe follows a young girl through her first 12 days of kindergarten in this book based on the familiar Christmas carol.
The typical firsts of school are here: riding the bus, making friends, sliding on the playground slide, counting, sorting shapes, laughing at lunch, painting, singing, reading, running, jumping rope, and going on a field trip. While the days are given ordinal numbers, the song skips the cardinal numbers in the verses, and the rhythm is sometimes off: “On the second day of kindergarten / I thought it was so cool / making lots of friends / and riding the bus to my school!” The narrator is a white brunette who wears either a tunic or a dress each day, making her pretty easy to differentiate from her classmates, a nice mix in terms of race; two students even sport glasses. The children in the ink, paint, and collage digital spreads show a variety of emotions, but most are happy to be at school, and the surroundings will be familiar to those who have made an orientation visit to their own schools.
While this is a fairly bland treatment compared to Deborah Lee Rose and Carey Armstrong-Ellis’ The Twelve Days of Kindergarten (2003), it basically gets the job done. (Picture book. 4-7)Pub Date: June 21, 2016
ISBN: 978-0-06-234834-0
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Harper/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: May 3, 2016
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 1, 2016
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