Leap!
Written by JonArno Lawson
Illustrated by Josée Bisaillon
Published by Kids Can Press
32 pages
Publication date: 5th September 2017
Age range: 1+
Summary (from Goodreads)
A flea asleep
in the deep green moss
nettled by midges
wakes up cross,
starts to fidget
and turn and toss.
Then his clever-legs twitch and he LEAPS into the path of a grasshopper. Which so startles the grasshopper that, she, in turn, LEAPS onto a bunny. And so it goes, dog, fish, bullfrog, horse and dog again, each leaping and upsetting the next. Until the dog finds herself in that same deep green moss. The flea sees his chance and leaps onto the dog. And, at last, they both fall asleep!
LEAP!
Land!
Twist and spin!
The bunny bounds out as the clouds roll in.
A dog gets a whiff
and barks at the wind –
bouncing, bouncing, springing
and lunging!
Down the bank that dog goes
plunging.
In this book a flea starts off a chain reaction of animals leaping, twisting, gamboling and spinning across the countryside as each bumps into the next.
This is a colourful picture book with rhyming text. It would be ideal for exploring with a younger child who is willing to spend time exploring the details hidden in the pictures and have fun discussing the language used – you could try leaping and twisting and moving in all of the different ways described in the book as well as coming up with your own words.
LEAP!
Crash
into the lake,
scaring the lake fish
wide awake.
They break the surface with a
flip, flop, shake!
What I liked: Beautiful illustrations and rich language.
Even better if: There isn’t much story or characterisation so some children will be left completely cold by this. Those who like the illustrations or enjoy playing with language may like it, but I imagine it will not hold much re-read value for children who are expecting a story with a distinct beginning, middle and end or characters they can get invested in.
How you could use it in your classroom: You could use this to introduce various words used to describe movement and have the children come up with their own movements and descriptive words in order to avoid all the characters in their stories simply standing, sitting and lying down. The pictures could also be used to make predictions about who will be affected next in the story, while the illustrations could serve as prompts for units about the Natural World.
(Thank you to Netgalley and Kids Can Press for my review copy)
Chrikaru Reads 
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