Tuesday, June 22, 2021

The Button Box by Margarette S Reid illustrated by Sarah Chamberlain


Tuesday Treasure


I have a button jar. Inside are buttons collected by my Grandmother, my mother, and a few I have collected myself. I loved sorting the buttons when I was a child. Sometimes my mother and I would hunt for buttons to add to her sewing projects (my new clothes). Looking at an old button can bring a flood of memories.

I also enjoy books about sorting. All Teacher-Librarians love to make order out of chaos. sorting books into Dewey Decimal numbers is actually fun and it can be a little like sorting buttons into sizes, colour, styles and shapes.

Ben loves to play with the buttons in his grandmothers box. There are buttons with painted flowers and buttons that resemble jewels. Some are covered with cloth and others are made from leather. Ben and his grandmother play a game with the buttons and then Grandma explains the materials used to make buttons such as glass, horn, wood and seashells. 

On the final page of this book you can read more about the invention of buttons. No one knows who originally came up with the idea but archaeologists have found objects that look like buttons under cities built thousands of years ago.

This is a simple book but I found it a joy to read. The Button Box was first published in 1990 and amazingly it is still in print but even if you cannot find this book why not grab your own button collection and enjoy a little sorting and conversation with your young reading companion.

What to do with a box of old buttons may seem like a slight notion for a book (and it doesn't made much of a story), but this lightly fictionalised enumeration of the ways that buttons' variety can open windows on critical thinking should provide an inspiration to parents and teachers.  Kirkus

Here are some other picture books about and featuring buttons:














My friend at Kinderbookswitheverything has two posts celebrating buttons:



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