Introduce your child to a few different forms of poetry with Button Up!, a fun collection of poems for kids. These 15 poems share a common theme of telling a story from the unique perspective of clothing items, but each poem uses its own format and voice, reaching readers in different ways. You will read poems told from a hat's point-of-view, hear what shoelaces have to say about being tied in bows, learn what a hand-me-down sweatshirt thinks, and even hear from a bitter old T-shirt - "They called me a dust rag! I don't think it's fair." The font is child-like and fun, with colorful poem titles, and plenty of rhyming and repetition. Each poem has at least one corresponding picture. Some are laid out with the poem on one page and the picture on the opposite page, while others have a picture after each stanza, making the whole poem take up two pages. The painted pictures are colorful and show cute cartoon animals wearing the clothing article referred to in the poem.
Your child will appreciate the humor strewn throughout the poems, whether it's the picture of Harvey splashing around wildly in a mud puddle in the rain, the poem about underwear, Violet wearing her hat in the bathtub, or how silly Jamelia looks in her dress-up clothes. They may enjoy making up the tune for "The Song of Harvey's Galoshes," as it reads like a song more than a poem; the lines with, "Squash-galosh" are particularly fun! You can also encourage your child to interact with the book by asking them what an article of their clothing would say about them.
My four-year-old niece, Emily, had an easy time picking out her favorite poem - "Emily's Undies", of course! She thought it was hilarious and asked me to read it several times through until she'd memorized the main line, "...Emily shows us wherever she goes."
--Audra