Pumpkin Soup: Celebrate 25 years of this timeless classic

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Make a list of the different words that are used instead of ‘said’ in the story, e.g. murmured, snapped, squeaked, wailed. Helen Cooper is an author and illustrator whose work includes classic titles such as The Bear Under the Stairs, Pumpkin Soup, The Baby Who Wouldn’t Go to Bed and Tatty Ratty. The book Delicious by Helen Cooper is an adorable and interactive book that will be extremely fun if used with your own children or students at school. There are many features to this book that I took a liking to and gave a prestigious five star rating to. In this book review we will look at the elements of design in picture books and go in detail what made me favor this book so much. The author uses repetition of words such as ‘scrumptious’, ‘nutritious’ and ‘delicious’ which would offer reinforcement for children expanding their vocabulary using the book.

Throughout the story it contains repetitions which could allow children to join in whilst the story is being read to them. The use of capitals in the story allows the children to see which words are being shouted this will allow the children to start thinking of expression whilst they read stories. The line and shape about a book go hand in hand with the description of the objects drawn. As said before everything that is drawn in the book looks real life and you’d be able to find these objects in real life. Since the book is drawn softly, it goes a long with the books fun theme. I feel this book would provide excellent opportunity for enhancing language skills, exploring food and animals as themes, and could be an excellent starting point for an interesting classroom display.

Cat plays a bagpipe and Squirrel plays the banjo. How do these instruments sound? How are they played? We’re still looking for the perfect recipe for pumpkin soup, ours always tastes bland and boring. We’d love you to share your favourite pumpkin soup recipe in the comments 🙂 The value of the book conveys different levels and dimensions in the illustrations. It goes a long with the books story line because they are looking for a lot of different vegetables and the illustrations capture the many levels of vegetation they are searching in.

Put the beets in a medium-size saucepan. cover with cold water and bring to a boil. Simmer, covered, for 30 to 40 minutes. Drain the beets and let them cool. The skins will then be easy to peel. Chop up the beets. (Make sure you wear an apron because beet juice is very pink!) First, the lines in this book are rounded and soft giving life to all the characters and objects in the story. Everything is drawn so it looks real, not just a one dimensional character that usually would look fake. Every object drawn has multiple characteristics about it, allowing a child to relate to something in real life.Librarian Note: There is more than one author in the GoodReads database with this name. See here for more details Helen Cooper is an author and illustrator whose work includes classic titles such as The Bear Under the Stairs, Pumpkin Soup, The Baby Who Wouldn’t Go to Bed and Tatty Ratty. Some of the illustrations were just precious (in a good way) and some I wanted to appreciate more than I did. They are unusual and wonderfully large. I think part of my issue was with the three animal characters. The soup, house, outdoor scenes were all lovely and/or spectacular. Helen Cooper creates a warm, inviting world in her “Pumpkin Soup.” It tells the story of three friends working through the challenges of friendship all while enjoying pumpkin soup. The narrative is very text heavy. Cooper relies more on words than illustrations. This could make it less appealing to younger readers with shorter attention spans. However, she does use different fonts and formats to help make the text more interesting. Retell the story to a friend. Can you use different voices and expressions? Listen to the audiobook version of the story.

The story got a bit scary at one point, even though the fear was limited to the imaginations of two of the friends. Everyone is happy when they have their own job to do. What jobs and routines do people do to keep everything organised? Do you have any classroom jobs? The mask can provide a source of inspiration for a pumpkin lantern design which can be cut into a pumpkin. Talk about the pumpkin as you make the lantern, the smell, the feel and how it looks both inside and out. Plant seeds

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Look at the facial expressions of the characters in each illustration. How are they feeling? What might they be thinking? One of the illustrations shows the animals making their soup, as seen through the window. Can you draw a picture with a view through a window (looking into or out of a building)? The language is expressive and descriptive, which sets the story in sentences which move at an exciting pace. ‘When no one was watching he peeled them, and sliced them, and chopped them, and diced them, and squished them and plopped them into the cooking pot’. It is a very nice tale about accepting our own limitations, pushing them, helping each others, and friendship. And pumpkin soup, of course!!

The general messages portrayed in to book include promoting teamwork; working together for a positive end result and helping others. In the illustrations, there is steam rising from the Pumpkin soup. What is this? How does evaporation work? added later] We made the pumpkin soup, and while our girls were pretty excited that we were making the recipe from the book (and they even got to add their own "pipkins" of salt), they weren't as enthusiastic about the taste. I thought it was lovely. Oh well... In a large saucepan, heat the oil and saute the onion on very low heat until it is translucent. This will take about 5 minutes. (Be careful not to let it burn!) The tale itself was a pretty good one, with everyone wanting to try each other's jobs and taking each other's skills for granted. On the whole, it's a fun story to read aloud and would be a good precursor to a discussion about fighting among friends, different skillsets and wanting to try different things. It has an easy recipe for pumpkin soup at the end of the story and our girls are excited to try it.

Space was definitely a huge part in this book; a lot of the illustrations were just the characters engaging in conversation with each other. In other illustrations they were shown in a huge field searching for different ingredients to put in their soup. Also, they detached the bugs from the story in many different places showing a side story that the bugs wanted to save the soup they were wasting. The story was written in third person describing all the events taking place. So the viewpoint was coming from a story teller. The media in this book I believe is colored pencils. The fine lines of colored pencil allow it to look more realistic. The color used in the book was also vibrant in some places and neutral in others, giving the reader more to look at and the urge to keep reading it to find out what other illustrations come next. I would say that the artistic convention in this book is expressionism because the illustration looks as if they want to convey what the characters are feeling. Pumpkin soup sounds so good, but Ill admit the only times I’ve eaten it are in restaurants, even though I have no doubt I have access to many recipes for it. Her books have been translated into 26 languages and won many awards including the Library Association Kate Greenaway Medal – twice. Write a set of instructions to teach people how to make pumpkin soup (see Resources below). You could also use this video to help you: