By Charlene Nelson
Good Sound Publishing
www.goodsoundpublishing.com
295 Olive Avenue
Palo Alto, CA 94306
888-696-2669
I Am So I Can is a short and simple picture book for beginning readers that is designed to build a child's confidence. Photographs of children dancing and playing are matched with statements like "I Am Creative So I Can . . . Build a fort." Early readers can read this book with parents or independently. The repetition of "I am so I can" makes this a fairly easy book for early readers.
The photographs in the book capture the playful attitude of childhood. The confidence-building message of the text is encouraging and motivational. The pages are colorful and cute. At the end of the book, there is a list of some things that children are and things they can do. Secular homeschool families may enjoy this book.
Personally, I have a few concerns about this book. One concern is that a lot of words are capitalized for emphasis or poetic breaks. I worry that the capitalization of words in odd places may confuse a young reader who is just beginning to form a concept of sentence structure and capitalization. My second concern came after reading the Foreword. It was a bit alarming to me from a Christian standpoint. Initially, I found this book cute, harmless, and even encouraging. However, the author's purpose, as stated in the Foreword, sounded a bit New Age to me. The author writes, "I AM is a sound of creation as well as the truth of who we really are--spirit beings living in physical bodies." To a Christian, "I AM" reflects the essence of God and is a key description of Him. In light of the author's perspective, I became uncomfortable with the "I AM" phrasing in this book. I would not recommend this book to Christian families.
Product review by Heather Randall, The Old Schoolhouse® Magazine, LLC, January 2010
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