Let's Go Outside!

June 6, 2022
Inclusive entreaties to engage with nature pair with lush, page-filling depictions of children frolicking throughout landscapes and seasons in this irresistible call to “go outside!” Among the actions, kids with arrayed abilities and skin tones are presented searching for bugs in a verdant forest (“Let’s be nature detectives/ hunting for minibeasts”), while others make snow angels in a frosty winter scene (“Let’s wrap up toasty-warm when it’s cold”). Ruiz’s illustrations are washed in bold, overlapping colors, as captured in a spread of children running across a meadow aglow with reds and oranges, and a creative type treatment adds a layer of playfulness (rays shoot from sun, sploshy bounces like raindrops) in this litany of things to do and discover. The back matter employs teacherly questions, encouraging reader interaction. Ages 3–6.