Just Keep Walking Along

Recommended for grades PreK-2nd

If you have or educate preschoolers, kindergartners, 1^st or 2^nd graders and you don’t have the following lyrics stuck in your head, then you better listen up:

“I love my white shoes, I love my white shoes, I love my white shoes!”

That simple chorus is the hottest craze with the younger students at my school currently.  The rhythmic repetition, the singing, and the change up of one single word in the chorus have all the students nodding their heads and singing along.  The genius author behind this book, Eric Litwin, manages to teach students inference, colors, and self-control by counting with fingers the number of times one sings the chorus—1, 2, 3!. 

The picturebook is all about color and the illustrator, James Dean, does a wonderful job making each page POP.  Pete the Cat is just walking along when “Oh no!” he steps in piles of strawberries, blueberries, mud, etc. and finds his white shoes have changed colors.  Pete doesn’t get upset; instead he “kept walking along and singing his song.”  Litwin explicitly tells the audience the moral of the story, which also happens to be one of my best friend’s catch phrases, “It’s all good!”

And I’m also super excited because Eric Litwin and James Dean are coming to my school to perform for my students!  Hip-hip-HOORAY!  That’ll be a mighty fine day!

Did I mention they have a new Pete the Cat book?—Rocking in My School Shoes.  Visit the publisher’s website to download the songs and other activities associated with Pete the Cat. 

 

Litwin, E. (2010). Pete the cat: i love my white shoes. New York, NY: HarperCollins.

                (2011). Pete the cat: rocking in my school shoes. New York, NY: HarperCollins.