Jane Godwin has written numerous books for very young children including All the Words I Need to Know, A Life Songand Little One. Kim Drane has illustrated the Handbooks for LIttle Humans series as well as this title where she shows how adept she is at using colour and white space to create cheerful accessible images for preschoolers.
Up, Down, Over, Through as the title suggests aims to familiarise readers with these spatial concepts. Children climb up, go down, over and through play equipment in the park, they swing high and swing low on the swings, they go up steps, stop and then slide down the slippery slide. You get the picture. All the important words – stop, low, high, over etc are in a larger bolder font, sometimes in a different colour. Its quite a complex little book in that it also covers big and small, fast and slow, beside, between and above and below.
Kim Drane has done her best to illustrate all these in bright cheerful scenes that will appeal to the reader. The text has a simple story arc starting in the park and ending with a desire to come back ‘in one more sleep’.
This would be a useful teaching book for child-care centres, prep schools and at home.
