10 Hungry Rabbits: Counting & Color Concepts
In this introduction to numbers and colors—which also champions healthful eating—poor Mama Rabbit doesn’t have anything to feed her hungry brood, so Papa Rabbit sends the little ones out to find the makings for a delicious soup. The 10 young bunnies head to the garden, each gathering colored vegetables and fruits (purple cabbage, yellow peppers, blueberries) in increasing amounts, from 1 to 10. Lobel’s gouache and watercolor illustrations are chock-full of charm and detail, especially the adorable, rotund rabbits—direct descendants of Beatrix Potter’s and Clement Hurd’s classic cottontails. However, it’s the educational components that are rightly front and center here, with both numbers and colors prominently highlighted, close-ups of grouped items for counting, and simple lines of descriptive text (“The seventh rabbit spotted SEVEN BROWN mushrooms”). An early learning concept book is an obvious choice for one-on-one sharing, but the book’s appealing scenes and petite size make it a good fit for little browsers, too. Preschool. --Kristen McKulski