Sea Shapes [Paperback]

Suse MacDonald (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: April 15, 1998 | Age Level: 3 and up | Grade Level: P and up

This engaging concept book invites very young children to identify basic shapes that transform into beautiful undersea creatures. Includes an informative glossary of sea facts. "Delectable viewing pleasure."--The Horn Book "Elegantly conjures up an undersea world in which a square evolves into a skate while hexagons combine to make a turtle's shell."--Newsweek

Editorial Reviews

From School Library Journal

PreSchool-K-Familiar shapes such as circles, triangles, and stars are introduced through various sea creatures. On the verso of each double-page spread, the name of the shape is printed in clear letters; underneath it are four pictures that show a transition from the shape simply drawn to its counterpart on the animal. For example, a circle becomes the eye of a whale, a star becomes a starfish, and a triangle becomes a shark's tooth. On the recto is a sea scene that shows the animal in its habitat. The illustrations are bright and nicely composed. Done in cut-paper collage, they have clean lines and simple details, giving an uncluttered effect. However, some shapes are not readily apparent in the animals. The square turns into a skate with curved sides and a long tail. The heart must add a tail and fins to become a butterfly fish. Three pages of "Sea Facts" at the end of the book identify the animals and provide a little information about where and how they live. This title has limited value as a concept book, but young children will enjoy the attractive illustrations and learning about underwater life.
Lucinda Snyder Whitehurst, St. Christopher's School, Richmond, VA
Copyright 1994 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

From Booklist

Ages 2-5. Each double-page spread is devoted to a different shape. On each left-hand page, a sequence of simple pictures shows a basic shape evolving into the shape of a marine animal. The opposite page pictures the animal in the sea. The brightly colored paper collages make it easy to follow along as the sea animal develops. The shapes chosen go beyond the ordinary to include, for example, a fan shape, a diamond, a crescent, and a hexagon. MacDonald uses the three final pages to present some information about each animal. If adults read those pages in advance, they'll be able to add interesting details to discussion of the pictures. Mary Harris Veeder --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Reading level: Ages 3 and up
  
• Paperback: 32 pages
• Publisher: Sandpiper; 1st Voyager Books ed edition (April 15, 1998)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0152017003
• ISBN-13: 978-0152017002
• Product Dimensions: 8.7 x 11 x 0.1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 6.4 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (2 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #734,683 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

I can't remember when I first knew I was an artist, because it was something that happened gradually.

I grew up in Glencoe, Illinois. My father was a professor at Northwestern University. My mother was a writer. We spent summers on an old farm in Weston, Vermont. My first art teacher was Churchill Ettinger, a Vermont artist who showed me how to visually transfer and translate the world before me to my paper. I can't remember how long I studied with him but by the time I entered college, I knew that art would be a focus in my life.

Since both of the colleges I attended were liberal arts schools, the courses offered were in the fine arts. No one talked about commercial art. It was considered a waste of one's talents.

I didn't think much about all that then. I just took courses: life drawing, painting, printmaking, ceramics. I even made sculptures out of car parts. Nothing I tried felt quite right. I knew I was an artist but where did I fit?

After college, I married, and my husband Stuart and I settled in New York City. I decided to find a job using my artistic talents. After a number of interviews, I contacted Charles Halgren at Caru Studios and discovered that he hired artists to illustrate textbooks from time to time. That sounded like the perfect job for me, so I called him every two weeks for the next nine months. Finally, a new biology book came in and I was employed to do pen and ink illustrations for it.

I stayed at Caru for Five years. It was a wonderful time. The studio employed thirty artists, photographers, draftsmen, and even typesetters (This was before computers, and type was set by hand.). I learned all about the commercial side of art and discovered what a fascinating world it was.

Then my husband and I moved back to the family farm in Weston, Vermont, and took over a construction company. Our move came at a time when I was beginning to feel a lack of growth in my work. I'd done illustrations for all kinds of science texts and was uncertain what to do next. So I was enthusiastic about our move and our new business. I did some office work and architectural design work and drafting, and we raised two children.

However, as time went on, I needed new challenges. Somehow I was off the track. When my second child entered first grade, the time had come to quit my job and return to school. At first I thought I would become an architect. I was good at architectural design and as an architect I could continue to contribute to our business.

I looked around, found the Boston Architectural Center and went down for an interview. While I was visiting a class on that first evening, I realized very suddenly (it was like being hit by lightning) that it was not architecture that I wanted to study, it was illustration. So my search continued, but now I was looking at art schools.

I enrolled in two schools, the New England School of Art and Design and the Art Institute. By taking classes at both, I was able to organize three days of classes each week.

After I began my studies my focus shifted. I no longer wanted to draw things just as they were, I wanted to look at them in new ways: to abstract them. Bill Oakes, one of my teachers, gave me lots of encouragement in this new direction. He wanted his students to question and get away from thinking in preconceived ways. As I studied with him my work began to change.

I also enrolled in Marion Parry's class in children's book writing and illustration at Radcliffe. It was in that seminar that I really became involved in children's books and decided that was where I wanted to concentrate my energies.

After I completed my studies in Boston, I took my portfolio with a variety of picture and story ideas to New York for appointments with editors and art directors at publishing houses. I had a total of forty-seven interviews over a three year period. I kept offering different ideas and suggestions for books. None was taken. But the situation changed with Alphabatics.

I showed the illustrations for just three letters, A, B, and E, to Bradbury Press, a Macmillan imprint. The idea was accepted, and my career as a children's book illustrator began.

Alphabatics is an idea that came to me while taking topography in art school. In the course, I worked exclusively with letter forms, shrinking and expanding them and manipulating their shapes in various ways. I was intrigued by the process and felt there were possibilities for a book. However, it was several years before I worked out the idea.

Publishing Alphabatics, my first, was very exciting. The book was well received and won two prestigious awards: a Caldecott Honor presented by the American Library Association and The Golden Kite Award presented by the Society of Children's Book Writers.

Since Alphabatics I have written and illustrated many books for children, including, most recently, Fish Swish, Spalsh Dash!, a counting book; Shape by Shape and Alphabet Animals for Simon and Schuster's Little Simon imprint. Alphabet Animals won the NAPPA gold medal in 2008, and received first prize in the novelty division at the 2009 New York Book Show.

A great pleasure for me is encouraging readers to go beyond their usual stopping points and make their own artistic discoveries. "Children are inventors, They thrive on situations that bring out that quality of inventiveness." In books like Alphabet Animals, I create opportunities for imagination and originality.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Multi-purpose picture book, June 15, 2000

By A Customer

This review is from: Sea Shapes (Hardcover)

Sea Shapes allows children to learn about shapes in their environment, creatures of the sea, and how to draw them. Bright colors and simple shapes help to make learning fun.

4.0 out of 5 stars wonderful teaching tool, August 22, 2011

By 

Hollys Preschool Place - See all my reviews

This review is from: Sea Shapes (Paperback)

I used this book with my Pre-K/Kindergarten students. We were doing an ocean unit so it was a good fit with our theme. The bright colors and sharp lines made it perfect for preschoolers. The progressive shape to picture was fabulous for preschoolers to see that everything is a shape, and drawing can be easy. This book is great for going across the curriculum, reviewing shapes, colors, ocean animals, and art.