MOUSE TELLS TIME

Time is a difficult concept for children, one that doesn’t get any easier with the reading of this tale. Young Mouse cannot wait to learn how to tell time. As he encounters different forest animals, he asks them, “How do you tell the time?” Hedgehog judges light and dark to determine if it’s day or night. This answer doesn’t satisfy Mouse. Squirrel looks at the lengths of the shadows, and which way they are pointing. Mouse doesn’t know east from west, and gives up this method when the sun goes behind a cloud. The Rabbit twins blow dandelions and end up telling Mouse it is two different times of day. And Grandma Mole has an hourglass that tells her when it is one hour later than it was before. Still confused and now hungry, Mouse returns home, where Mother tells him that time is not as hard as he thinks. If he is hungry it must be suppertime, sleepy, it must be bedtime. But she does promise to teach him to use a clock the following day. A foldout page at the end pictures Mouse and a clock as he goes through his daily routine. The watercolor illustrations are marvelous, capturing the greens and browns of nature, and portraying the forest animals realistically. Unfortunately, the story is not one for aspiring clock watchers. (Picture book. 4-7)