Elem. – When We Are Kind; Lift

Smith, Monique Gray. When We Are Kind. Orca Book Publishing, 2020. 978-1-459-82522-2. Unpaged. Grades K-2.

How do you define Kindness? How are you kind to others? How is Kindness expressed to you? Throughout the text, Monique Smith highlights simple acts of everyday kindness. She addresses kindness to nature, humans, and kindness to oneself. From helping the elderly to feeling comfort from a pet cat, Smith finds simple ways to explain kindness to young children. Artist Nicole Neidhardt’s illustrations beautifully complement the gentle text.

THOUGHTS: A warm book that shares many examples of kindness through simple text and colorful pictures. Use this picture book to jump start lessons on what kindness looks like, ways students can be kind to others, and how students feel when someone is kind in return.

Picture Book          Ramona Klein, Keystone Oaks SD

 


Lê, Minh. Lift. Little, Brown Books for Young Readers, 2020. 978-1-368-03692-4. 56 pp. $17.99. Grades K-2.

Iris loves to push elevator buttons, and whenever her family rides up or down, pushing the button is her job. But one day, she is betrayed when her younger brother reaches out and pushes the button! Disgusted, Iris snatches a discarded elevator button panel out of a trash can and tapes it next to her closet door. When she clicks the button it lights up with a “Ding!” and the door opens onto a lush jungle. Later that night, Iris steps through the doorway into a gravity-free space station high above the earth, but her brother’s cries keep her tethered to reality. In the morning, excited for her next adventure, she holds her brother’s hand and lets him push the button after realizing that “everyone can use a lift sometimes.” With minimal text and sequential panels in the style of a graphic novel for early readers, this magical picture book contains great depth of meaning. Iris’s excitement, exasperation, and wonder are are all vividly portrayed through Dan Santat’s illustrations. Many readers will connect with the theme of adapting to life with a sibling, from Iris’s grudging protectiveness of her brother to the unfettered adoration he clearly has for her. 

THOUGHTS: As they did with their very well-received 2018 collaboration, Drawn Together, in Lift Lê and Santat encapsulate the magic found in not just discovering an adventure, but sharing it. 

Picture Book          Amy V. Pickett, Ridley SD

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