Every week I try to get new books when I take my three younger children to the library for story time. This is a set time that we go each week as long as we are feeling well and in town. I feel it is good for them to be able to learn to sit and listen to books read by other people and it exposes them to other children as well.
This last week we picked up some books as usual and in them I had found a book with a boy and a penguin on the cover that kind of reminded me of a video that the children had watched a few times about a boy who returns a penguin down to Antarctica, so I picked it up. It happens that this book was written by the author of the other story and it is called Lost and Found. As I do not recall reading the actual book I hope that the video is word for word from the book and I would recommend it. I will have to look this week for the book and take a look at it myself.
It also helps that I enjoy penguins and have quite a few stuffed penguins floating around our house. With my love of penguins, my children have also started to be drawn to them and so we all enjoy reading books that have penguins in them.
When we read this book it was a great story of a penguin who has a dream of flying. I think it fits the idea many people have of penguins since they are one of the few birds that do not fly. In fact I even have a shirt that has the evolution of one penguin from an egg down to it having a jet-pack in order to fly when no other way became of it.
This penguin at first gets help from the boy who is his friend in trying to find a way to learn to fly. As it progresses the penguin does believe he has found a way to make his dream come true and goes off to do so, but without the boy.
I believe this book is a great example of people wanting to do things on their own, yet also realizing that sometimes we need the help of others in our lives. To me, this book says that even if we want to try something in life and do not succeed in the way we want or need, our family and friends are there to help us up and sometimes even to catch us as we are falling down. We may want to go through life on our own, which I have been seeing a lot from my daughter as she is trying to be as independent as she can be, but there are times when we need those who love and care for us to give us a hand in life.
While I know that this is a children’s book and most young children will not see the things that I have mentioned in it, the adult has the responsibility to help those they are reading to see the moral of the story. While the author may not have had this in mind for the story, it is how I took the story. If you have read it and have another opinion I would love to hear what it is.
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