I Went Walking

I really do love this book written by Sue Machin and Julie Vivas. It is a lot of fun to read with Hannah. The simple page layout with large, colourful pictures grabs her attention easily.

The storyline is simple enough. A young child (who’s gender is impossible to identify, so for the flow of this review I’ll refer to the child as “she”) goes for a walk through a farmyard. As her journey progresses, she comes across the rear end of a range of animals. Each time, the picture is accompanied by the words “I went walking. What did you see?”. I assume the purpose of this is so that your child can guess what the animal might be, but because Hannah is only eight months old, I just exclaim “COW’S BUTT!”

On the following two-page spread we then see a picture of the full body, as well as all the other animals that the young girl has collected along the way. This is fantastic, because I can easily point to each animal and make their sound to Hannah’s delight.

A funny little quirk of the story is that from about half-way through, the child starts shedding her clothes. I have read the book many, many times and I’m still not sure why this is, but I am a little worried that it’s sending the wrong message to my daughter. It’s already hard enough to dress her and keep things like hats, socks and bibs on. I don’t need a hero of hers from a book to encourage her to further disrobe.

This book is an oldie, but a goodie. Worth having on your bookshelf.