Multicultural Children's Literature
Here Are My Hands
Home | About Me

by Bill Martin, Jr. and John Archambault
Illustrated by Ted Rand 

Bill Martin, John Archambault, and Ted Rand team up to compose a deceivingly simple book that acknowledges the similarities in children while at the same time validating each child's unique identity. Preschoolers will delight in the rhyming text:  "Here are my hands for catching and throwing. / Here are my feet for stopping and going." Each double-page spread highlights a different body part belonging to an ethnically diverse group of children.

 

A previous reviewer[1] of the original edition noted that "the featured part is sometimes lost in the gutter of the book." The board format of this edition, however, eliminates this problem; the pages fully open and lay flat. This format makes the book readily accessible for both a read-to-me and a read-by-myself. Here Are My Hands is a book that children will want to read again and again.

 

 



[1] Gifford, Nancy A. 1987. Review of Here Are My Hands. School Library Journal 33 (10): 86.

 

Martin, Bill Jr. and John Archambault. 1998. Here are my hands. Illus. Ted Rand. New York: Henry Holt. ISBN 0-8050-5911-3.

Enter supporting content here