As an early father’s day gift I was sent this cool book, ‘Because I Am Your Daddy’. Mr Pants was thoroughly impressed with it. He was particularly enthralled with the page about surfing. Nothing like taking your kid out for a paddle on your surfboard, tandem style.
The essence of this simple story shows how important it is to fathers to spend quality time with their kids. The writer Sherry North, effectively expresses how much a father will do for his kid no matter what he is or where he goes. His child comes first. The illustrator, Marcellus Hall has portrayed an entire world within each pages theme. The artistry is fantastic, and complements the story wonderfully.
My brother and I recently saw Brenda Bowen speak to the employees at Dreamworks studios. She is a children’s book publisher and agent. One of her main points was that in an illustrated kids book, it’s important to tell a story within the images. To use details within the illustrated scene to go beyond the written words, to create a narrative within the drawings themselves. She reminded us how much time you can spend with your kids on each page, talking about all that’s happening in the scene. And that is so true. As a parent with a toddler, I think he is paying closer attention to the images than the text I am reading. But even with older kids, the imagery is important. It’s fun for me, and educational for my kid, to point out all the extra details and objects within the drawings of a story.
And the drawings in I Am Your Daddy does that very well. The drawings are great. Within each scene, there is a whole story to be told. We spend several minutes on each page talking about all the details in the scenes. (Mr Pants especially likes the seagulls soaring above the wave they are surfing.)
Fathers, spend extra time reading with your kids each day. Turn off the tv, it’s okay, you can do it, and pick up a good book. I would bet that you spend more time talking about the images within the pages of a good book, than the images on a Saturday morning cartoon. And have an excellent (early) fathers day this year.
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