When I was growing up, I was naturally drawn to stories that featured children who broke the rules. Eloise, and many of the 'naughty' characters from Roald Dahl's books were my heroes because they prevailed in spite of everything. In today's picture book you will meet a fish who does something bad. He knows that what he is doing is wrong, but he does it anyway. The ending is rather surprising, and perfectly perfect, under the circumstances.
This is not my hat
Jon Klassen
Picture Book
For ages 4 to 6
Candlewick Press, 2012, 978-0-7636-5599-0
One day a very small fish steals a hat from a very large
sleeping fish. The small fish thinks that the large fish “probably won’t wake
up for a long time,” and even when he does wake up the fish won’t notice that
the hat is gone. After all, the hat is very small and the big fish probably
barely felt it.
Just in case,
the little fish decides to hide in a place where the plants are “tall and close
together.” A crab sees where the little fish is going but it promises not to
tell anyone where the little fish is hiding. The little fish justifies the
theft of the hat, which he knows was a bad thing to do, because the hat was too
small for the big fish.
The little fish
makes it to his hiding place and swims in amongst the plants. He is so sure
that “Nobody will ever find me,” but it turns out that many of the assumptions that
he made were completely wrong.
This beautifully
crafted book, with its simple tale and cocky main character, will delight young
readers. Children will be able to see how wrong the little fish is as he talks
about what he has done and how to plans to get away with the theft of the hat.
They will see that the little fish’s confidence and optimism is, alas,
misplaced.
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