What Do You Do with a Tail Like This? (Caldecott Honor Book)
by Steve Jenkins, Robin Page
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Book Summary Information
Author: Robin Page, Steve JenkinsBrand: Houghton Mifflin
Edition: Hardcover
Audio: English (Unknown); English (Original Language); English (Published)
Published: 2003-03-25
ISBN: 0618256288
Number of pages: 32
Publisher: Houghton Mifflin Books for Children
Book Reviews of What Do You Do with a Tail Like This? (Caldecott Honor Book)
Book Review: What Do You Review With A Book Like This
Summary: 5 Stars
This book is breathtaking, a real stand-out visually -- and at the same time grippingly educational and fun for kids. If you want to see that dawning light of curiousity and hunger for understanding in a child that's just learning that it's fun to learn, there's no better book than this one.
The animals are rendered with great richness and depth by (if you look closely) beautiful torn-paper collages. It's so skillfully done by Steve Jenkins that all of the creatures are full of personality, and seem to live in a batik-cartoon world.
The riveting part is how there are so many animals that each have unusual stories revealed through fun and different and interesting body parts. This is not a "first animals" book at all. Rather it gains its fascination by showing how animals make so many different uses of their body parts, uses that go against what you first think.
For instance: A platypus uses its nose "to dig in the mud." But "[i]f you're an elephant, you use your nose to give yourself a bath" [image of trunk squirting water back over elephant's head]. For ears, you learn that a jackrabbit uses its ears to keep cool, and crickets have ears on their knees. A chimpanzee can eat with its feet, and a gecko's feet are sticky so it can walk on the ceiling. And so on.
Engrossing and whimsical from page to page again and again. Just wonderful!
At the end of the book, a section includes a one-paragraph "bio" with additional details about each animal, with the rest of the story on the unique appendage. For example, the chimpanzee has some general description, and also this detail about how they eat with their feet: "Like people, they have an opposable thumb. Unlike us, thy also have an opposable big toe. This allows them to pick up and manipulate things with their feet." This description is obviously way more advanced than the book itself -- but children love to hear more of the story about characters or animals from the adult reading to them, and this book gives you (the adult) the back story for every one of them.
I was floored when What Do You Do with a Tail Like This arrived. Giggly and awed at the same time. The reviews didn't prepare me for how much I'd viscerally like this book the moment I opened it! I cannot recommend this highly enough!
Summary of What Do You Do with a Tail Like This? (Caldecott Honor Book)
A nose for digging? Ears for seeing? Eyes that squirt blood? Explore the many amazing things animals can do with their ears, eyes, mouths, noses, feet, and tails in this beautifully illustrated interactive guessing book by Steve Jenkins and Robin Page.
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