There are Meadows on Meadowview Street

On Meadowview Street
Written by Henry Cole
Illustrated by Henry Cole
Harper Collins/ Greenwillow Books, 2007
30 pages
Realistic Fiction

             This book literally “jumped off the shelf at me”.  I was getting the book beside this one and it came off the shelf, too.  I opened it and saw the wonderful rich greens and blues, so I had to read the book.  I mean it “begged” me to read it.  In this book a young girl and her family move to a new house on Meadowview Street.  She was bored and wished there was an actual meadow where she could play.  As she started to walk around her new neighborhood, she found a beautiful flower in her yard.  She asked her dad not to mow it down, and as time passed, more and more flowers appeared in the yard.

            The surreal illustrations are done with acrylic paints.  The illustrations spread across both pages with the text on the art work itself.  The text is a bold print.  The uses of rich greens, blues and soft yellow and red are beautiful.  The facial expressions on the people in the book are soft and very easy on the eye.

            Preschool through sixth grade readers will enjoy this book.  It has bright colors and is easy to read and understand.  Using this book in a class lesson for science will be easy to teach about eco systems and plant life.  For a social studies lesson, the story teaches how the actions of one can inspire others and how communities can work together to make a difference.  For a language arts lesson, the children can do a journal entry about if they have ever moved or wished they could move.  On Meadowview Street was nominated for the California Young Reader Medal, Grades K-3, 2011-2012.