My Friends Make Me Happy! and My Toothbrush Is Missing by Jan Thomas

Today's guest contributor is Michelle Young. Michelle works as a branch manager in a public library system, but is still a children's librarian at heart! She served on the 2018 ALSC Caldecott Award Committee, and is currently reading adult fiction and nonfiction for the 2019 RUSA Notable Books Council.

Jan Thomas is a must-buy at my library for her humorous storytime hits. Although the story structure and illustrations are similar to those in her earlier picture books, this traditional beginning reader format makes it more likely that kids who are learning to read independently can discover this series while browsing.

Both titles seem like decent Geisel Award candidates, though My Friends Make Me Happy! is stronger with its guessing game involving words that begin with the letter "F." Another nice feature is the use of thought bubbles as well as speech bubbles, which introduces children to a common comics element. Kids will feel smart because the clue to the correct answer is in the title, so they know what Sheep's friends don't. Also, it's obvious that "turnips" does not begin with "f" so they can also feel smarter than Duck while laughing at his devotion to the root vegetable.

Since I am encouraging my toddler to brush her teeth before bedtime, I was delighted to discover My Toothbrush is Missing, which is a rare book on hygiene that is fun and not didactic. This book seems like a Geisel Award contender because Donkey is so ridiculous that kids will want to find out what other thing he has confused with a toothbrush. Other elements of this book are friendly for emerging readers:

• The almost-wordless sequence where we see a hoof reach for a toothbrush (labeled "Dog"), followed by a spread with an empty cup and the title page with a speech bubble declaring "My toothbrush is missing!"
• Dog, Donkey, Sheep, and Duck are all highly expressive creatures so their reactions to Donkey's queries add to the humor
• There are lots of basic sight words with some more unusual words like "bristles," "giant," and "scrub" sprinkled in
• The pattern of the dialogue, with Donkey trying to recall seeing Dog's toothbrush, provides repetition of the phrase "-----? Weird. I feel like I’ve seen it…"

This story seems conducive to introducing young children to readers' theatre. The occasional variety in fonts (boldfaced, red) can help children know which words to emphasize. The use of different punctuation marks (commas, periods, question marks, exclamation marks, and ellipses) give them an opportunity to practice reading in varying tones.

My sole criticism of this book is that Donkey's last attempt at locating the toothbrush results in the procurement of an egg beater, which may be unfamiliar to young children. It's also not as clearly identifiable as the cat or the broom.

Overall, both books are solid adds for any beginning reader collection and may have Geisel Award potential.