I love this book for exploring the question of using themes in storytime. (And because I love magical realism for the very young when it works this well!) Yes, you can skip the theme all together for lots of good reasons (Check out the work of Megan Lamber for more on this topic.) But this book allows you to add it to a very long list of storytimes – night, zoos, elephants, counting, even umbrellas! Borrow the new elephant puppet and the umbrella die-cut for some fantasy book play ~ Who knew? (Storytime props for FLLS members only, sorry!)
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I did like the story and illustrations of this book, however found the artwork a little subdued for larger reading audiences. May be hard for children to truly appreciate the illustrations.