On the Farm by David Elliott

Illustrated by Holly Meade. Candlewick Press, Cambridge, MA, 2007.
Hardcover edition, 32 pages, ISBN 978-0-7636-3322-6.

Meade's stunning and engaging earth-toned, double-spread woodcuts create a masterful backdrop for Elliott's simple, wry poetry. Children will delight in investigating the details of life on the family farm while absorbing clever observations on resident animals.

The Barn Cat
"Mice
had better
think twice."

Horn Book Starred Review
Cybils Award in Children's Poetry Books, Nominee, 2008
Raising Reader Selection, 2009

Take Me Out of the Bathtub by Alan Katz

Illustrated by David Catrow. Margaret K. McElderry, New York, 2001.
Hardcover edition, 32 pages, ISBN 978-0689829031.

Katz showcases a collection of 14 very funny song poems such as "I've Been Cleaning Up My Bedroom" meant to be sung to the tune of "I've Been Working on the Railroad", and "Sock in the Gravy" sung to "Rockabye Baby". All of the topics center around ordinary home and family events gone awry, and all of the tunes are familiar nursery rhyme ditties or folk songs. David Catrow adds to the mayhem with his fanciful illustrations of food fights, overflowing bathtubs, and (ick) carsickness.

A couple of the songs need practice to scan properly, but most work well enough to sing at a toddler or preschool storytime.

Singing songs to familiar tunes aids in memorization. Most of the songs have a short plot line or expository story to tell to help with narrative skills.

Chicken Soup With Rice by Maurice Sendak

HarperCollins, New York, 1991.

Hardcover edition, 32 pages, ISBN 978-0064432535.

Sendak's classic personal-sized Book of Months is comprised of a dozen seasonally appropriate verses of a single poetic tribute to a traditionally winter staple. Accompanied by simple black and white sketches colorized in pastel blue, yellow and green, each fanciful verse follows an easily memorized pattern of rhyming triplet with contrasting three-part refrain:

"In June

I saw a charming group

of roses all begin

to droop.

I pepped them up

with chicken soup!

Sprinkle once

sprinkle twice

sprinkle chicken soup with rice."

The strange applications of chicken soup are sure to keep children laughing as they join in on the refrain.

Great for quoting during programs, the format being too small to share pictures with a group.

Helps teaching the narrative sequencing of months, and easy memorization of rhyming text.

Timothy Tunny Swallowed a Bunny by Bill Grossman

Illustrated by Kevin Hawkes. HarperCollins Publishers, New York, 2000.
Hardcover edition, 32 pages, ISBN 1-4046-4732-5.

A hilarious collection of six-line poems featuring a succession of strange characters in even stranger predicaments. Each offering ends with an ironic slapstick twist echoed or explained by the boldly humorous illustrations, as in the following with a woman pictured seated in a rowboat in the middle of a desert.

The Woman in Town
"There's a woman in town
Who's afraid that she'll drown
If ever her nose should get wet.
So she wears on her snoot
A small scuba suit.
And it works--she hasn't drowned yet."

Easy to memorize individually for use as a quick filler during a program, or in selected groups.

The rhyming text promotes phonological awareness, while vocabulary is strengthened with some less familiar words understood in context.