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K-6th Grade Poetry

Genre: Poetry, Science, Non-Fiction, Picture Book

Age Range: 8-12 years

Summary: There is a poem for each major body in the solar system plus a few extras. Each poem is in a different style and there is a section explaining the type and structure of the poem as well as additional information about the subject.

Why did I choose this book to review?: I found this in a list of poetry books for children by the School Library Journal. It sounded interesting and my local library had a copy.

Evaluation: I will be evaluating the book's illustrations, language, and format.

The illustrations for this book range from landscapes to planet portraits to starscapes and fit the subject and central idea of the poem well. For the poems that talk about the surface of the planet, landscapes are used to give an idea of what the planet looks like. The gas giants get planet portraits that show off the beautiful colors or odd shapes. Jupiter is special because its illustration is covered by the poem, combining the two elements into one. There are also sections in the book that explain the format and content of the poem as well as expand on the science of the subject, and these often have small illustrations showing different aspects of the planet, star, or other celestial form. One of the poems is about the asteroid Arrokoth which has an odd shape. The illustration shows the lumpy asteroid and how it is shaped like similarly lumpy poem chosen to represent it.

The poetry of the book is unique to each entry, with no subject or type of poem repeated. This makes the book more interesting since it adds another interactive element to the poem - why was this style chosen for this subject? The author offers reasoning for each one, but the book actively challenges readers at the end to make their own poems and perhaps choose a different style for ones already made. Through the books very existence, it also negates the argument that the arts and sciences can't co-exist. The reader can love space and poetry or art, just like the author. Oftentimes we put people into one category or the other, and this book says, "Why not both?" In addition to the poem and the poetry explanation, there is also a page that gives more detail about each planet, usually focused on one or two major details that we know about. These sections will often expand on something mentioned in the poem, offer diagrams, or explain how we discovered it. There is also a "Glossary of Space Terms" in the back along with additional sources and resources for the excited space lover to use to learn more so they can create their own space poems. I think this would be an excellent book for use in a classroom, especially as a way to combine assignments from English and Science class into one project.

The format of this book is different from most books. I got the physical copy, and every poetry page is actually an extra long page folded in half backwards so the fold opens from the middle and goes to the right. This gives each entry an illustration page on one side, the poem facing the the illustration, and the space and poetry info on in the inside of the fold-out page. It gives the appearance of four separate pages in the space of just two, and gives each aspect of the book its own space. It's possible that a digital version of this book would be a decent replication of this look, but there's no denying that there's just something inherently fun about an unordinary shaped book. It does, however, need a little help to close right so the pages don't get creased or dog-eared.

Lewis, A. W. (2024). A planet is a poem (O. Averill, Illus.). Kids Can Press.

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Books about Disability

Genre: Juvenile Non-Fiction, Disability, Picture Book

Age Range: 4-8 years

Summary: The author explains how his disability - a severe stutter - feels and affected his school life. One day, his dad helped him relate it to how a river moves and changes.

Why did I choose this book?: I found it on Library of Congress list of books for Disability Awareness and it was one of the first ones I found at my local library.

Evaluations: I will be evaluating the format, the illustrations, and the text.

My library has both the audiobook and physical versions of this title, so I experienced both at the same time. I think the audiobook might be the more intended version of this content since the author himself is the narrator. This book is about the author struggling with his stutter as a young child, and while the picture book tries to use metaphor to explain how the words feel to the author, they can only help so much. Listening to the audiobook and having to wait for the narrator to finish forming his words is closer to what talking with him might be like. The audiobook doesn't edit out any extra sounds, repeated phrases, or stutters since this is all part of the point of the book. The audiobook also includes aesthetic additions like water sounds when they get to the river, which can remind listeners that rivers are not so smooth up close. The picture book has complete words with no repetition or literary stutter markers like repeating the first letter of the word, so it loses some of it's impact. If the reader knows all the words used, they could blow right through the book and not "get it".

The illustrations of the picture book tries to convey the author's troubles with speaking by illustrating the metaphors, but I think the picture book does a better job of conveying the loneliness and anxiety that having such a severe stutter brings. Most of the illustrations show the author alone as a child, except for when he takes the trip to the river with his dad and when he is called on in class. The classroom illustration is repeated twice. In the first one, the art style is the same as the rest of the book, showing the boy at the back of the room. The lines are clear, there are plenty of details like the clock on the wall, the patterns of the clothing and the windows in the door. Everything is where it should be. In the next illustration, everything is blurred and jumbled, the colors bleed and blur, going hazy at the edges. Everything is slightly crooked or in the wrong spot and there is are a lot of black spots like air brushing or as if some of the paint was wiped away. The perspective has even changed slightly to give the impression of looking down a long hallway or that the room has suddenly become circular. The contrast between these two illustrations, made easier to notice since they face each other, is stark and is easy to recognize by anyone who has had serious nerves when speaking in public. The main aspect of the book's illustrations that matches the central idea of the text is that this book is made up of paintings, or digital illustrations that are meant to look like paintings. By using paint, the illustrator ensured that no two pictures are the same. The style changes slightly with every illustration; sometimes the lines are crisp and smooth, other times they are filled with lines or dots. Sometimes the illustrations are more like watercolors with layers of color bleeding through, other times they are sharp and solid with very clear lines. This is similar to how the author can talk smoothly with some phrases and stumble over others and sometimes even the same word can have this variation.

The text of the picture book has a lot of placement variety. On some pages, the words are spaced out around the page, sometimes they are bound by lines, and other times they are formed into stanzas. This creates a sense of disruption in the reader as it can be difficult to figure out which word comes next. While it doesn't seem like the author has trouble stringing thoughts and ideas together, this kind of disruption to the reading process could mimic that hesitation, especially if the book is being read aloud. The book is full of metaphors, relating his stutter or mood to different natural phenomena. This helps the reader try to relate to why the stutters happen as well as show that having a stutter or other speech impediment does not mean a lack of intelligence, as the stereotype suggests.

Scott, J. (2020). I talk like a river (J. Scott, Narr.) [Audiobook]. Dreamscape Media.

Scott, J. (2020). I talk like a river (S. Smith, Illus.). Neal Porter Books.

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Biography

Genre: Biography, Juvenile Non-Fiction, Picture Book, Science, Mental Health

Age Range: 5-8 years

Summary: This biography tells about Temple Grandin's life growing up different, and her accomplishments in animal science, and her challenges with autism.

Why did I choose this book to review?: I found it on a Library of Congress list of children's disability books. My local library has it listed as a biography, so I switched it to this category.

Evaluation: I will be evaluating this book's illustrations, text, and accuracy.

Since the book's title is about thinking in pictures, it's no surprise that it also attempts to replicate how those pictures might look for Grandin. The artist uses circle-framed pictures connected with lines to show various aspects of what Grandin is thinking and how they are connected. White lines show a general connectedness, green lines show a positive connection, and red lines show a negative connection. There are also dotted and full lines, but it is less clear what they mean or why they are chosen to connect those objects.

The text of the book is in rhyming couplets, which can make the book fun to listen to and is a more interesting format than simply listing off facts about Grandin's life. It also allows the text to be formatted slightly different, like stair-stepping a stanza down the page or using all caps to emphasize certain words. The textual content of the story focuses less on Grandin's agriculture related achievements and more on how her autism shaped and affected her life. This leads to the potentially frustrating fact that if a young reader wants to learn about her inventions, how they work, why they work better, or even her inspirations, they won't find them in this book. This could lead to those readers looking elsewhere for information, and there are several sources in the back of the book for them to use as follow-up material, but it could also lead to them thinking she didn't actually do much. The first half of the book does a good job in showing several different ways how Grandin's autism presented in younger years, which could help young readers identify themselves in the text.

The book also seems highly researched and accurate. Temple Grandin was highly involved in the creation of the book and it shows. The end of the book includes a letter from Grandin to young readers, a Fun Facts section that goes into more detail about her life, a timeline that features events that happened in this book and additional points of interest, a highly detailed About section that goes over much of the same time shown in the picture book but using more literary language, and finally, a Reference page that breaks their sources into books, articles, and videos. While these parts of the book seem incongruous with the story part, it also makes the book accessible on several different levels. If the pages are there and the reader is curious enough, it is possible that they would eventually come back to these pages, or that the adult reader would continue with them to help answer questions the child may have.

Mosca, J. F. (2017). The girl who thought in pictures (D. Rieley, Illus.). The Innovation Press.

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Coretta Scott King

Genre: Historical, Picture Book, Children's Non-fiction

Age Range: 8-12 years

Summary: Describes what Tulsa, Oklahoma was like before, during, and after the event, why it occurred, and the responses by the two communities.

Why did I pick this book to review?: This was the first Coretta Scott King award winner I found at my local library.

Evaluation: I will be reviewing the illustrations, the format, and the language.

The illustrations in this book have a similar texture to photos from the 1920s and the slightly washed out colors bridge the gap between sepia tone and more modern color photo printing. Every person in the book is drawn realistically, with no attempt at caricature, even for the white aggressors. Several of the illustrations feature the people in them facing forward, like they would for taking a picture, though I was unable to find an interview that said the illustrator used real photos from then as reference. However, there is a page with a black man holding his hands up in surrender that matches part of the statue mentioned at the end of the book, and those statues were based on real photos taken during the massacre. The inside covers are also used to tell part of the story, with an illustration for how Tulsa looked before in the front cover and a photo used as the back cover. The front illustration shows two building filled city blocks with a very broad street between them, whereas the back inside cover photo looks like the aftermath of a hurricane with only rubble and the empty shells of half of two buildings visible. There are more buildings barely visible behind a white fog, but it's unclear if this haze is due to smoke that was still there when the photo was taken or if it has degraded due to age.

I read the physical version of this book. It is fairly large, slightly larger than a spiral notebook, which gives the reader the chance to look closely at the large full page illustrations. Reading the physical version is probably the best way since the book is large enough to see all the details without needing to zoom in. Reading this book digitally would likely also disrupt the flow of the two-page spreads as well, since they would need to be either split in two or shrunk to fit two pages in a space meant for one. I also don't think an audiobook version would be a good substitute either, though, of course, it would be fine for a read along tool. Similarly to Ahoy! by Sophie Blackall, the illustrations for the book are crucial to the story's impact. The illustrations give a visual demonstration of the damage done before and after the riots and that impact would be lost in a purely audio format of this book.

Many of the pages before the attack start with the phrase "Once upon a time," which is the traditional beginning of fairy tales, evoking a similar kind of fairytale mythology quality to how things were before. It makes the story even sadder since it could imply that a similar level of prosperity in a predominately black community could never happen again. A lot of the text tells what Greenwood had, like hotels and doctors and how many people lived there, but it is still hard to get a handle on either how big or how dense this area was. Even while describing how the riots started, the language of the text stays as neutral as possible, which further emphasizes the book's final message of rejecting hatred and choosing hope.

Weatherford, C. B. (2021). Unspeakable: The Tulsa massacre (F. Cooper, Illus.). Carolrhoda Books.

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Texas 2x2

Genre: Picture Book, Adventure, Fiction

Age Range: 4-9 years

Summary: Child and parent go on a make-believe sailing adventure in the living room.

Why did I pick this book to review?: This was the first 2025 Texas 2x2 book I found at my local library.

Evaluation: I will be evaluating the book's illustrations, language, and primary theme.

Unlike some picture books, where the illustrations help the reader imagine the story, the illustrations in this book are the story. There is no narration, only speech bubbles, so the reader must infer what is happening between the art and what little text there is. The story starts with the child bringing a bunch of seemingly random objects into a room with a large rug - presumably the biggest play space - but no! This spot has been chosen because the rug looks like the ocean! There are several other instances in the book where the illustrations help the reader puzzle out what the imaginary things are during playtime: a paper towel tube is transformed into a telescope, an orange and white striped neck pillow becomes a life saver; the vacuum is actually a giant squid intent on trapping the parent, pillows become sharks, socks become seagulls, and lastly, the lighthouse that shows that they are home safe is the other parent dressed in the same red and white stripes. Even though the illustrations in the beginning show what the "ship" is made out of in real life, it's these kinds of parallels that really help children see things in a different way and help them stretch their imagination. The illustrations also continue on the front and back inside covers, showing how the child getting started playing in the front and all three together on the imaginary boat in the back, which helps further the idea that the second parent was eager to join in the fun once they got home.

This book is also chock-full of sailing terminology, to the point of having a glossary in the front. This has a chance to teach both the child and adult reader what these words actually mean, while also being fun to listen to and imitate later. The text of the book is given different colors for each character and the cell phone ringing, so it is easier to tell who says what. It is notable that all of the defined sailing terms except one are said by the child character. This would exemplify that not only can children learn these technical terms, they can also figure out how to use them correctly during imaginary play.

The theme of the importance of together time is recurring throughout the book. The child invites the parent to play, who initially says they have work to do until tempted by being allowed to help draw the map. Later, when play is interrupted by a phone call, the child seems to give up on the game until the parent draws them back in by being attacked by the giant squid. The game resumes and continues until the second parent gets home and the game seems to end, however, the back inside cover shows all three of them on the boat, indicating that the game once again resumed and now they all get to have some playtime. This aspect of the book feels like it is talking more to the parent-reader than the child-reader, reminding them to take some time and play while they can still go on adventures like these.

Blackall, S. (2024). Ahoy! (S. Blackall, Illus.). Anne Schwartz Books.

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Bluebonnet Award Winner

Genre: Children's Literature, Fiction, Picture Book

Age Range: 6-9 years

Summary: Oliver the tortoise loves his pet human Ike. When Ike disappears, Oliver seeks out his mother's wisdom about why.

Why did I choose this book to review?: It was the first Bluebonnet award winning book I found at my local library. Also, my mom likes turtles, so I have a soft spot for all things turtle-shaped.

Evaluation: I will be talking about the illustrations, pacing, and themes of the book.

The illustrations in this book are a nice blend of realistic and cartoonish; this allows emotion to be shown on Oliver's face without the dark outlines that would make the art more like a comic than a photo. There is a nice blend of two page spreads and single page illustrations, most of which are framed low to the ground, where Oliver's point of view is. Despite being so low to the ground, the illustrations are still colorful, with lots of flowers, fruit, or other tortoise goodies at Oliver's level.

The pacing of the book is shown by the month of the year above the text of the story. It always changes by month, and usually one month per two facing pages until the second half of the book, after Ike's passing. It gives the first half a kind of steady and monotonous pace, giving the feeling that things will continue like this forever. But once Ike dies, the pacing is all over the place. Two months pass in two facing pages, then one month stretches out over four only to shrink back to one again. This change in pace not only makes a visual joke in how long it takes the tortoise to get anywhere, but also shows that coming to terms with and moving on from death can take a long time.

The primary theme - and the plot - is about learning to accept death and I think this book does a good job in framing and explaining what could be a hard topic for readers, especially if they have recently lost a pet or elderly loved one. This book isn't to teach readers what death is, or how to overcome grief, but rather to help reframe life as something fleeting and precious and to enjoy the people we care about as much as possible while they are here.

Scillian, D. (2020). Memoirs of a tortoise (T. Bowers, Illus.). Sleeping Bear Press.

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List of Books

K-6th Grade Level

Memoirs of a Tortoise by Devin Scillian

AHOY! by Sophie Blackall

Unspeakable: The Tulsa Race Massacre by Carole Boston Weatherford and illustrated by Floyd Cooper

Cruzita and the Mariacheros by Ashley Granillo

First State of Being by Erin Entrada Kelly

The Girl Who Thought in Pictures by Julia Finley Mosca and illustrated by Daniel Rieley

A Planet is a Poem by Amanda West Lewis and illustrated by Oliver Averill

I Talk Like a River by Jordan Scott and illustrated by Sydney Smith

Growing Pangs by Kathryn Ormsbee and illustrated by Molly Brooks

New Kid by Jerry Craft

7th-12th grade level

Brownstone by Samuel Teer

I'm Kinda Chubby and I'm Your Hero by Nore

Gender Queer : A Memior by Maia Kobabe

The Maid and the Crocodile by Jordan Ifueko

Not All Boys Are Blue by George M. Johnson