Blog Entry #4

Pete the Cat: Rocking in My School Shoes

Written by Eric Litwin

Illustrated by James Dean

HarperCollins Publishers, 2011

32 pages

Fiction

            I chose this book because it is a popular selection with elementary schools and teachers. Pete is a cool character, the story is fun, and the book is musical. Pete the Cat is about a very cool cat that goes to school in his “rocking red shoes.” As Pete goes to the different places in the school, and does different activities in each place, he sings his song. Every place he goes is different, but Pete does not worry. In the story, the reader is asked to guess which place in the school he will be going next.

            In Pete the Cat, the medium was painting with watercolors. Pete is dark blue and most of the backgrounds in the book are blue, yellow, or green. There are a lot of bright, primary colors in this book. Most of the colors used were blue, black, red, green, yellow, and orange. Even though the colors are bright, they are softened by the texture of the watercolor. It looks as if drawing in pen may have been used for the outlines in Pete the Cat.

            Pete the Cat would be appropriate for kindergarten and up. I believe children of all ages would love this, and it would appeal to girls and boys. A kindergarten teacher could use this book for a read aloud after the class has toured the school for the first time and have the students guess which room Pete will be going to next. It would let them know that they should not worry about going to a new place and to just keep on going like Pete did. For other grades, it would be a good example for instruction on rhyming words and alliteration. This book has no awards or honors.