Empathy Week June 2023

A pictorial guide to the picture books we shared this week, some basics about Empathy, and links to further resources.

What is Empathy?  "The ability to understand and share the feelings of another", including 

Stories with props | Summer Term II 2022

No props with this one, we used ourselves as props and became all the different birds on the story.  The children especially like the pink "flingoes"....

A great going to school story for those little ones leaving us to go to big school 😥

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What I read July / August 2021

[ my image -  Bempton Cliffs, Yorkshire, July 2021 ]

Sunflower Sisters by Monica Singh Gangotra and Michaela Dias-Hayes. Owlet Press have done it again, this is another one that will be a contender for my best of 2021! A beautifully illustrated colourful story of 2 weddings and 2 friends, Amrita and Kiki, who's sister and brother are getting married the next day. Amrita's Aunty makes some comments about their skin colour, which she thinks should be lighter to be more beautiful. But Mum soon puts her straight, Amrita and Kiki are beautiful in their skins just how they are. This powerful story opens up conversations about skin colour, and colourism, why treating a person differently because of the shade, tone and colour of their skin is always wrong, and what we can do to change this. Be curious, challenge attitudes, listen and learn, and speak out. Published by Owlet Press in July 2021, so you've probably seen it in a bookshop window somewhere near you. Find out more here https://www.owletpress.com/product-page/sunflower-sisters.

Here be Dragons by Susannah Lloyd and Paddy Donnelly. A hilarious knightly romp, where the really rather silly knight goes off to look for the really rather clever dragon. He never does find that dashed dragon...or does he? Helped along the way by his trusty steed, and a princess that he doesn't even rescue, the knight gives us plenty to chat and laugh about. Published by Frances Lincoln childrens' books at Quarto Knows

Book Review | Reclaim Early Childhood | Too much too soon

Reclaim early Childhood - The philosophy, psychology and practice of Steiner-Waldorf Early years  by Sebastian and Tamara Suggate and Too much, too soon? Early learning and the erosion of childhood, edited by Richard House

A Heuristic Play Story

This is a story about a boy who plays, builds a story and is totally immersed using only what he found around him at that moment.

We're on holiday in France and we stop for a picnic in the woods, under the shade of some pine trees.  It's beautifully warm and sunny.  The boy finishes his baguette and the rest of his lunch in record time as usual.  Then he looks around for something to do.  He doesn't have his football.  The ground is covered in pine needles, making a soft blanket, it's really spongy and thick.