The Beat Goes On: Farmyard Beat by Lindsay Craig and Marc Brown

SHEEP CAN'T SLEEP!

SHEEP CAN'T SLEEP!

SHEEP CAN'T SLEEP 'CAUSE THEY'VE GOT THAT BEAT!

The sun goes down, but the animals are all up. Chicks hatch and peep to the beat, waking sheep, who get that beat and tap-tap-tap their feet, waking the cat who... Well, you get the drift in this tale in which cows and farm dogs take up the catchy rhythm and and start to swing that music! Only the owl is supposed to be up at this hour, and he finds the whole jam session a real hoot!

Finally Farmer Sue is up and out to see what's going down (or, in this case, what and who are up!) Shining her lantern on the barn dance, she can't resist joining in.

JIG! JIG!
JIGGETY-JIG!

EVERYONE'S DANCING TO THAT BEAT.

T-I-L-L...
...THEY ALL FALL IN A HEAP.
ASLEEP!

As in their 2010 hit, Dancing Feet!, author Lindsey Craig and best-selling creator of the Arthur series, Marc Brown, have another movin' and groovin' dance number for the preschool group in their latest collaboration, Farmyard Beat. Brown's soft, textured, and beguiling paper collage animals add to the appeal and Craig's rhymes and rhythms offer lots of possibilities for singing and moving actities for preschool groups or individual kids who like to move their feet to the beat.

Gotta Dance!! I Got the Rhythm! by Connie Schofield-Morrison

I HEARD THE RHYTHM IN MY MIND... BEAT! BEAT!

A stroll into the park gets this girl's pink-sneakered feet tapping out the beat all around. She shakes her shoes with the rhythm of the breeze in the trees, feeling the beat in everything.

Some boys drum on trash can lids, and she snaps her fingers and claps her hands.

I HIPPED AND HOPPED!

BING BANG BOOM!

A boy cranks up his boom box to add a tune to the music mix. The song is infectious, and other kids follow the leader, and soon there is a whole parade of kids moving to the beat behind her. Even a street clown falls in line, and moms, dads, and passersby join in a rhythm section that has everyone dancing.

It's a spontaneous, rhythmic happening in the King Award-winning Connie Scholfield-Morrison's brand-new I Got the Rhythm (Bloomsbury Press, 2014). Artist Frank Morrison's vivacious little heroine is hard to resist as she dances through the park, absorbed in the joy of moving to the beat, and his urban park hustles and bustles with the colorful food vendors, wannabe buskers, and people ready to have some fun. A natural for preschool students learning about the elements of music and an easy for choice for early readers to enjoy on their own.

Partner this one with Lindsay Craig's and Marc Brown's Farmyard Beat and Dancing Feet! for more two more toe-tapping tales. (See my reviews here.)