Customer Reviews

Leaf Man (Ala Notable Children's Books. Younger Readers (Awards))

5 star:		(21)
4 star:		(3)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

This book is getting good reviews for good reason. Lois Ehlert uses images of actual autumn leaves to tell a simple story. And yet, it's not that simple. In each colorful double-page spread, the leaves are arranged in order to form figures: a man, barnyard animals, farm crops, etc., whatever supports the text. As we advance through the story, we realize something different about the book. The top edges of the pages aren't cut straight; they swoop to become horizon lines that change with each page turn, simulating the colorful rolling hills of autumn. What a wonderful surprise! Who would have thought of that technique? It's perfect for the story. The leaves are close at hand, and yet your eye catches the distant landscape, just as it might in real life.

What I like most about this book is that it is educational in a subtle way. It doesn't scream, "Here are leaf projects for you to try!" It merely tells a story using leaves, and lets the readers become inspired to gather up and create leaf creatures of their own. In other words, teaching and leading by example. On the end-sheet of the front and back covers, sample leaves are each identified by tree name -- again, with subtlety. If you want to know the names of the trees they came from, fine, there they are. If you are too young (or too old!) to care, then the words do not intrude on your view of the leaves or the enjoyment of the book. I can see that reading this book to a group of observant youngsters would take quite a while. There's so much to see, and you might not catch it all the first time through. "Leaf Man" requires multiple readings.

This is a beautiful, educational picture book that will appeal to all ages. It should be mandatory for nature center libraries and elementary school libraries.

My husband bought this for our two-year old, and we love reading it together with her. The text is simple, as it traces the journey of Leaf Man...the leaves used are magnificent in their colors...some bold, some subdued, but all unique and beautiful. I have since done some basic art projects with my daughter using this book as inspiration. We collect leaves wherever we go and hope to create a little book of our own!

Wow, lots of people apparently like this book, but I can only judge by the reactions of my children to the book, and they didn't really like it that much. Certainly not as much as some of Ms. Ehlert's other works like "Snowballs" and "Growing Vegetable Soup".

I think the principal reason they didn't go bonkers over "Leaf Man" is that there really wasn't much of story. Leaf Man (or Leaf Guy as we call him) blew around a lot, but it wasn't as if he had any opinion about the process or that there was any drama.

Three Stars. The artwork was good and, as always, very creative-- the source of much discussion and our own art project-- but when you get down to it, Leaf Man just blew around. Worth checking out at the library.

I borrowed this book from my local public library to read to my 2.5 year old granddaughter. She was so taken by the story we were out looking for "leaf man" as soon as I finished the story. We found Leaf Man, the ducks, fish and butterflies. We also found Pumpkin man, Horsey and goosey. In short, this story brought out the creative juices in my granddaughter and we had fun patrolling the local area for leaves, nuts, berries and other goodies dropped from our neighborhood trees. We glued them down on card stock and gave them away as gifts.
Get this book, get on your scarves, jackets and boots. Take your grand kids or your kids and get outside. You won't regret it.

My five year old and I really enjoy this book. My son enjoys looking for the pictures the leaves make and I enjoy the fact that the author collected these beautiful leaves, made images out of them and wrote a story around them! Colorful, imaginative, fun to read.

I checked out this book at my school library yesterday. It was a really beautiful book! Even though I'm eleven years old, I loved it. The illustrations are cleverly created from real photocopies of leaves, and some of the pictures look so real that from far away, they simply look like photos. There are just enough words for perhaps a 4-5 year old to read.
The story tells of the travels of Leaf Man, blowing over fields and animals and trees.
I really think that the pictures are the main part of the book.

5 stars!

I was totally impressed by the illustrations of this book and the use of real, fall leaves to create the pictures. Like Jack in JACK, THE STORY OF A LEAF, the story of Leaf Man tells of the adventure of leaves being blown about in autumn. The art work makes this especially beguiling and inspires you to head outside to look for leaves to create your own creatures and scenes.

Leaf Man had great illustrations in it. Each page was covered with colorful leaves all over the place. Throughout the story, Ehlert mentions different animals, and on the page is that animal made out of leaves. If reading this to a young child, they would love seeing how the leaves form into animals. The story is very cute as well. I think this would be best for pre-k.

Shows what leaves come from what trees in the beginning and end of the book, clever animal shapes made with leaves & differently shaped tops of pages adds another dimension. Very fun, pretty & educational!

Ms. Ehlerts childrens books are beautifully written and illustrated; Leaf Man is no exception. The textbis simple yet engaging, and the artwork of leaf collages is beautifully executed. I bought this book after seeing it on an art teachers blog as a resource for a project, and ran to get the book myself. Ms. Ehlerts books never fail to delight.