Be A Friend, a relatable lesson for kids of all ages

For us the best children’s books manage to make us smile from the cover. Be A Friend by Salina Yoon gets that (and many other things) right throughout the entire book. It has a boy dressed as a mime giving a young girl an imaginary flower. The image makes you smile and the happy vibes continue in this book that’s great for kids 3-7, but in reality any age can pick it up and learn something from it.

Dennis is the mime in Be A Friend. He’s a bit different, as anyone who is a mime would be; a little shy at times, but has fun in his own particular way.  We see his friends have fun playing in a tree, while he has fun pretending to be a tree.

At times he gets a bit lonely and it’s here that a classmate sees his imaginary toys and starts to play with him.  The girl’s name is Joy and the two of them start to play on the playground with the two of them joining everyone to play on the book’s final two pages.

OK, I just gave away the entire book, but this is intended for children and in that realm it hits the target right in the center. The layout of the book is horizontal, which allows the play landscapes of Dennis or the children playing really has room to breathe.  Astute readers (see: the adults) will also pay attention to the white space in the book and how it’s used to impact young readers feelings and understanding about the story.

Be A Friend meets out requirement for a fabulous good-night book because of that too. The blank space that surround the main art work is colored, every page is packed with something and some of the pages are corner to corner illustrations. That variety page design helps make a fun book to read at night because it shakes things up for the parents and the children.

The vocabulary in the book is on par with one of Yoon’s previous books, Found. Some of the words are OK for sight readers, while others may require parental help. The font is big, the sentences are simple and the lesson that the book teaches is timeless and one worth remembering.

We’re all different.

That lesson is one that we talk about lately. Our youngest child has apraxia. In our case it delayed his speech to where he was placed in the Special Friends program at our local school. We’re thankful that it’s only his speech that is being impacted. In a couple years his speech will be on par with his age group.

However, he’s such good friends with his Special Friends now we sometimes wonder if he’ll continue to be in the future. Certainly he’ll age out of some of them, but will this experience make him more empathetic, outgoing and open minded when he’s older? We hope so.

Be A Friend isn’t just for parents in our boat. It’s for any kid that might feel like an outsider, different or like they haven’t found their groove.

Be A Friend, by Salina Yoon

Age range: 3-7, but anyone will enjoy it.

Positive themes: being different is OK, acceptance and playing together

Why kids will like it: The art is very good, has different sized pictures and is very silly at times. The pictures are also ones that kids will relate to, with them playing, throwing balls and pretending.  Many of the words will be ones that sight readers can handle and are in big font.