Arts

About the book

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Dear Parents, 

This fun and interactive book takes us on a journey with our child, where we knock on doors filled with surprises. These surprises allow the child to explore their world, and give us, the parents, the chance to see things through their eyes. 

The book helps expand our child’s knowledge, enrich their vocabulary, and expose them to various concepts such as: colors, numbers, shapes, and animal names. It also opens the door to conversations about feelings and develops different sensory skills. 

We rejoice as we see our child grow rapidly, experiment, feel, and learn. When we allow them to experience diverse situations and accompany them with patience and love, their curiosity and desire to learn and explore flourish, and they acquire new skills and information. This strengthens their abilities to understand and express themselves. 

Let’s hold our child close and knock on the doors of the book together. Let’s read and enjoy it side by side. 

Before opening the door: Ask the child to guess what’s behind the door based on the color or the picture.

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Let’s Talk 

Before opening the door: Ask the child to guess what’s behind the door based on the color or the picture. Knock on the door and open it together, then observe the illustration and ask: Who’s behind the door? What are they doing? Name the characters, the objects, and their actions. 

About feelings: Talk to the child about the characters’ emotions. For example, ask: How did the rabbit feel when it ate the carrot? 

About preferences: Ask your child what color they love, and look together for objects of the same color. 

Explore the meanings of some verbs mentioned in the book

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Let’s Enrich Our Language 

Explore the meanings of some verbs mentioned in the book such as: knock, nibble, rub—then act them out together. It’s important to use these words with your child in daily life. 

Let’s Broaden Our Knowledge 

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Let’s Broaden Our Knowledge 

Colors: Choose a door color with your child, and search the room for objects of the same color, naming them together. 

Let’s count together: Hold your child’s finger, trace the animals on the page, and count them. You might ask: How many rabbits do you see? How many monkeys? Then: How many fingers on your hand? How many eyes do you have? 

Imitate the sounds of the animals in the book.

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Let’s Play 

Imitate the sounds of the animals in the book, like monkeys, or objects like a drum. Listen to the different sounds around you, whether indoors or outdoors, name them, and imitate them. 

Let’s talk...

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About plot: We can observe the details of the illustrations, and encourage our child to describe them, follow the events, and make connections. We notice changes in the sea scene, the girl, and the birds, describing the girl’s feelings each time.

About personal experiences: Have we experienced similar feelings? How and when? We can recall our journeys, adventures, moments, and various experiences.

About seas and nature: What does the sea remind us of? Which seas have we visited? What other natural places do we know? We can compare them: how are they similar or different?

Let’s enrich our Language...

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Description and comparison: We can describe the girl’s features and the feelings she expresses. We can compare them in each scene.

Birds: We can pay attention to the birds in the drawings, think about their relationship with the girl, and learn about their characteristics and advantages.

Names: We can suggest a name for the girl, think about our own names, who gave them to us? We try to remember the stories and meanings behind our names.

Actions: We can observe the girl’s movements and name them. We can also perform similar actions.

Let’s play...

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The book stands out as the illustrations tell the story without words. Let’s play “Pictionary.” We can agree on signals that indicate things and guess them through movements.

Let’s explore...

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Seas: we can visit a nearby sea, look at the sunset or sunrise, observe the waves, and enjoy the beach sand. We can look for scientific information: How are waves formed? What marine life lives in the sea and what distinguishes them?

Nature: We can choose a natural place for a shared We can visit it, appreciate its details, listen to the sounds, get to know the creatures, describe and play together. We may search the internet and encyclopaedias for information about the place before or after the visit.

Let’s create...

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Paintings of nature: we can collect materials from nature during our outing and create paintings to decorate our home. (Paintings from seashells, mountain stones, or garden leaves).

Our book: we can document our moments with pictures and compile them into a book for the story of our enjoyable journey. What do we want to add to it?

guess the soun

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The first time we read the book, we can stop on the last page (16) and encourage our child to guess the source of the sound.

We can take a tour...

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We can take a tour around the house, and listen to the sounds emanating from each room, and try to define it: is it a rattle, a tick, or a buzz? We can also listen to the voices outside: How do the sounds coming from outside differ from the ones inside?

We may search...

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We may search with our child for other items in our near environment that complement the song of Zena, such as: brrring, brrring/…it rings. We may add new sounds that match the objects we find, and form a choir like Zena’s!