Snow Music

Lovely exploration of what kinds of things kids, dogs, and a deer experience when they wake up to a snowy day. I'd like it even more if I could appreciate music... I love how some of the musical sounds are described using art that looks like a sheet of music ready to play. Some parts are like concrete poetry, too; my favorite there is the squirrel bounding about looking for a lost cache.

I see that another reviewer marks it as a mentor text, and I like that. There's a fair bit going on here besides 'story' that a class or family could draw inspiration from.

This book was not terrible; however, I did not care for it very much. The first reason I found myself not gravitating toward this book is because of its choppy writing style. For example, one page of the book had text that read “It found the snow, and the deer’s cold feet” when it was talking about the sun coming out, and the next page read “There he is! I see him” in reference to two children playing hide-and-go-seek in the trees of a forest. These two pages have nothing to do with one another, and it makes reading the book confusing and awkward which is why I did not resonate very much with this writing style. One aspect of the book that I did appreciate was the resemblance some of the pages had to actual sheet music. For show more example, one page in the book was titled “A Car Went By” and under that title was the text of the page placed in between a grand staff and had onomatopoeia under musical notes that made the sound of a car passing by. I liked this aspect of the book because it caught my attention due to my love for music, however because this was not done throughout the book and was only used on a few pages, this added to the choppy writing style, thus creating a bit of confusion for me. Overall, the main idea of the book was to detail some aspects of the time period between winter and spring and to highlight those aspects by playing into the reader’s senses such as sight when the author placed the text on the page to resemble a deer’s footprints and hearing with making the text look like musical lyrics and pairing that with the use of onomatopoeia. show less

(easy) This is a beautiful picture book. I felt I could really relate to it because I have seen such a wintry silent snowfall several times in my life as I lived in the North once before. The author and illustrator have been able to perfectly capture the breathtaking beauty, the snowy smell and the crisp sunny air you experience the morning after a snowfall. The word they chose to describe the sound of snow falling, "peth" is actually quite close! That word choice made me smile. There is a bit of conflict; the boy can't find his dog, he wonders if the deer's hooves are cold and there is a resolution of both. No real character development, just two neighborhood boys out exploring the wintry day. Regardless of the lack of story elements, show more the book is just too beautiful to give it any less than four stars. Children who have been in the snow will be able to relate, and with a good oral reader, children who have never had the pleasure will be able to visualize and hopefully experience it in their own way. show less

The children enjoyed this one very much. We shared the book as a kind of choral reading, with children performing the parts of the speakers, and acting out the sounds the author gives for trucks passing by, the sound of the falling snow, or the sigh of the rising wind. The clever conceit throughout the book is that winter in this small town creates a kind of music, so Perkins has shown snowflakes as musical notes, and a "score" for the sounds made by a car passing by with its radio playing, a dog that has slipped its leash, or a salt truck barreling down the road. The illustrations are lovely, with a muted winter palette.This is a great book to read on a snowy day!

This story was written as if it is a lyrical narrative. It began with the silent sound of snow falling, with all of the animals and humans in their nests and beds asleep; adding to the silence. When the morning arose, the little boy woke up and opened the door accidently letting his dog outside into the snow. He went in search of his dog. Along his journey, he watches the silent deer leaving a path in the snow next to the little birds’ foot prints. The boy met another child and they searched together walking around through the quiet snow. Finally, the dog turned up and the silent noises of nature surrounded the family. It ended showing a snow globe on the boy’s nightstand.

This story finds the song in the snow. The author shows that there is music all around us. The sound of sow falling “Peth”, the sound of breathing “huff”. If we listen, we can hear it, and even contribute. This story features neighbors coming together to look for a lost dog amongst all the music. The illustrations are wonderfully done. Perkins captures the calm and beauty of nature during winter in her detailed rendering of animals. She blends her colors in a way that evokes feelings of softness and calm from readers.

Details: This book was written to interst children in grades K-3 and is on a 2.6 reading level.

This book has a lot of music in it. It rhymes and at some points has music written out on the page along with the words. It's all about a boy looking for his dog after his dog ran out of his house during winter. It was very creative.