Title: The Visitors
Author: Clare Thompson
Price: £8
Published by and available from: Get Naturally Creative
Good for: parents or people working with children age 1-100
Best bit: Stunning artwork created from natural loose parts
Worst bit: no hardback version available
More thoughts:
It’s rare that I have a review for a book which isn’t specifically to do with faith at home, families, intergenerational church or similar, but this book is a STUNNER and so inspiring! I love using loose parts at home, and we’ve used them since our children were babies. As they’ve got older, the loose parts have become ways of creating stories which sometimes get turned into book or even mini-films.
This story is told without words (yes!) and the pictures are all photographs of the most beautifully constructed natural loose parts pictures. Clare uses shells, flowers, rocks to create both the backdrop and the characters in this wonderful story. And YES you can tell what is happening without words, and it’s one of the most wonderful things, as you can ask simple, open-ended questions like: I wonder where this is…. I wonder what they’re doing… I wonder who this is and then listen as the story opens up!
I would recommend getting the book and using it alongside a simple loose parts Invitation to Play. Our latest one includes Autumnal things from a forest: dry oak leaves (wings!), acorn cups (hats and bowls!), sticks, beech nut cases and so on. I’ve put these out in the sections of a wooden cutlery tray alongside white IKEA picture frames with a black piece of sugar paper in them (plastic ‘glass’ front removed). The book gave me the idea that the natural items might look more ‘poppy’ on the black background. And you can also use it to draw on with chalk, which also pops on black.
