Starred Review If the Platonic ideal of the young children's comic both helps them interpret their world and introduces new ideas for them to explore and expand on, then Brunetti has brought that conceptual model into actual existence. A teacher offers her class circles, triangles, squares, rectangles, hexagons, and pentagons, following up with octagons, diamonds, hearts, and stars. The classroom bursts into action as the diverse group of children begins to spot those shapes and create with them. A girl draws herself out of shapes in an example of how we interpret and adapt real-world shapes: how, with just a squint, our flat, mathematical facts fit into actual life. Combining shapes creates vast new possibilities and imbues the still and mechanical with life and personality, as circles are placed within the rectangular windows of a bus to fill it with people. The ladder of knowledge rises ever upwards: six squares combine to make a cube and, waiting when children are ready, cones and cylinders. The words are simple and informative, delivered with straightforward clarity, while the characters and environment de of the very shapes we're studying here fer a sense of recognizable and spirited fun. The ideal read-aloud for an introduction to shape-related projects and a perennial resource to support joy in developing knowledge.

An introduction to circles, squares, triangles, and more.A teacher and a classroom of children begin noticing shapes around them. An umbrella looks like an octagon; the lenses in the teacher's sunglasses are shaped like stars. From there the students create images using shapes, notice them on the playground, and build things with three-dimensional cylinders, cones, and cubes. The opening pages are busy: Shapes litter the classroom floor. A particularly compelling illustration shows a grayish piece of artwork, drawn by the kids, depicting the town, followed by an image of the town filled in with colors-and plenty of shapes. Readers looking closely will pick up on clues in the images that help tell the story, like a kid getting whacked by a ball on the playground. Although there isn't much plot here-no characters are named, and the story is mostly a demonstration of shapes in our surroundings-the story does serve as a strong introduction to graphic novels, balancing full-page images with panels and helping readers navigate the action and home in on details in the larger illustrations. The teacher is brown-skinned, and the students have a variety of skin tones and hair colors, their bodies themselves geometrically composed. (This book was reviewed digitally.)Will have readers eagerly pointing out the shapes around them. (Early reader. 5-8)