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This book is about leaves; how the make food, how they behave throughout the seasons, how leaves differ plant to plant, it even includes an experiment in the end. The book begins by inviting its readers to take a walk and look around at the leaves they see. The water color illustrations are inviting and colorful. The book goes on to explain photosynthesis, a very abstract concept for pre-kindergarten students. This provides an opportunity to expose them to words they can use elsewhere: soak, store, develop.
The book discusses how plants are important to us: oxygen. As the book goes on, the information is organized by season (spring, summer, autumn, winter).
The pictures in this book were lovely for explaining plants to children. The picture of a flower shows the roots underground and the water spilling into the soil to be absorbed by the roots. I also liked the book as a source of information, but I found the monotone nature to be a problem. There is not one exclamation point or question to engage the audience. It is one short informative sentence after the next.
There were some pages in the back of the book that served to foster any further curiosity and as a glossary. There was also a venn diagram that compared evergreens and non-evergreens. This was very interesting and helped me come up with supplemental activities. After this read aloud, I planned to take my students on a leaf walk and make a venn diagram of our own, looking at leaves from our playground/campus.