Chil­dren’s

All That We See, Say and Do

Beth Intro; Robin Skol­sky, illus.
  • Review
By – April 2, 2012
When the author’s father died, her four-year- old daugh­ter had ques­tions about God. This book, writ­ten in rhyme and from a tra­di­tion­al per­spec­tive, describes how Hashem is part of our dai­ly lives and can be found all around us in beau­ty, love, kind­ness and thank­ful­ness. Trans­lat­ing these ideas into a for­mat that is suit­able for very young chil­dren takes a deft touch, and this book is not entire­ly suc­cess­ful. Although the book express­es ideas about where we find God and deals with feel­ings and actions appro­pri­ate to preschool­ers, some of the rhymes are awk­ward and do not flow well. The illus­tra­tions are child­like — puff-paint­ed, white stick fig­ures and sim­ple draw­ings of flow­ers, hearts, suns, moon and stars on col­ored back­grounds. There is a pos­si­bil­i­ty this would appeal to young chil­dren, but it is unlike­ly to inter­est the adults read­ing it to them. The illus­tra­tions triv­i­al­ize the sub­ject rather than expand it to stim­u­late the young reader’s imag­i­na­tion. Even though the book was inspired by a death, it does not touch on the sub­jects of death or loss. This paper­back book is sold as a kit, which includes a book­mark and a sim­ple parent’s guide for doing activ­i­ties and cre­at­ing read­ing games with the 30 sight words. Ages 3 – 5, grades Pk – K.
Diane Levin Rauschw­erg­er is librar­i­an for Con­gre­ga­tion Beth Am, Los Altos Hills, CA, and has worked as a children’s librar­i­an for the Sun­ny­vale Pub­lic Library. She is the author of a series of children’s pic­ture books, includ­ing Dinosaur on Hanukkah, Dinosaur on Passover, and Dinosaur on Shab­bat, pub­lished by Kar-Ben Publishing.

Discussion Questions