The Bear's Winter House by John Yeoman and Quentin Blake

"If you help me you can share my winter house."

Poor bear. It is time to hibernate. He wants to be comfortable through those long cold months. He finds a house plan and he is begins to build a perfect shelter.  In scenes reminiscent of The Little Red Hen, the other animals of the forest arrive and scoff!  They think his idea is silly but when winter comes they see Bear's shelter works much better than the flimsy homes where they are trying to stay warm. One at a time each of the forest animals, the squirrel, hedgehog, hen and pig, arrive at Bears winter house. Bear could turn them away but instead he says "come in".  Keep in mind Bear built this house to stay warm and to hibernate. His house is now crowded and so very very noisy. How will Bear ever get back to sleep?

Read this book on a cold winter day.  Here is a set of ideas to use with pre school children if you are exploring the idea of hibernation.  I found this list of other fiction and non fiction books on this topic. This book was first published in 1969 but my copy is from 2009 and is a larger format with a different cover. I am happy to see it is still in print.