Harmonious friendships take practice, and quarrels and fights are common occurrences among youngsters.
Making friends, being a good friend, breaking friends. These issues affect every child (and many adults, too!) and can be stressful, challenging, and upsetting. From their early days in the nursery, through play, children learn essential social skills and learn about themselves too. Assessing friendships is a very normal phase that is to be encouraged.
Friendships are one of the essential parts of childhood—and school! Classroom conversations about making new friends, supporting and appreciating friends, and navigating friendship challenges are always in season. There is no better way to launch them than with a good book. Author Rosella Calauti’s book entitled “Friends Here…There…Everywhere!!!” is built around the subject of friendship. Young readers can surely relate to the characters in this picture book and can help reassure and comfort them that what they are experiencing, although often very upsetting, is normal and that things will, at some point, get better.
Book Synopsis
Friends Here…There…Everywhere!!! centers on encouraging children to discover healthy friendships during their first encounter outside the home. It uses everyday events to suggest ways and strengthen community awareness to make and keep friends. It also teaches children about adverbs and opposites. The book provides opportunities for children and adults alike to discuss the meaning of friendship and becoming positive community role models and good citizens. Salvatore, Lee, Brandi, Erika, and Lori, enjoy pretending, playing together, caring, and sharing. They delve into their community and build friendships that remain throughout time. Young children will find the cartoon images enjoyable and playful. This book will interest readers because it is educational, easy to read, age-appropriate, and has appealing, colorful pictures that exercise a child’s imagination, so they can confidently make friends interact and dream. The characters are effective role models. Also, adults have an opportunity to implore their childhood memories, strengthen relationship bonds and develop more effective communication.
Behind The Picture Book
Friends Here… There… Everywhere… was written to enhance literacy and social development in young kids, ages two to five. Growth starts at different rates for each child in this significant period of action that arises as they learn to become independent. The book encourages young kids to feel secure as they experience and develop their first experience of building a friendship. At the same time, they explore the world and continue to become individuals. It is ideal for parents, teachers, and caregivers who wish to discuss how to play and share cooperatively. In addition to the topic of making friends, this book introduces adverbs (here, there, and everywhere) and helps develop recognition of words that are opposites. It can motivate children to ask about friendships, relate to them, and suggest places to find friends while strengthening reading and writing skills.
Further, as a children’s advocate, Calauti hopes her book will help tots feel secure in experiencing their first encounters outside their homes and encourage them to explore their communities. Her Purple Dragonfly Award Winning children’s picture book is an excellent beginner reader book that helps prepare children socially. It supports literacy development and has colorful, eye-catching illustrations of friends in everyday situations.
On the other hand, Calauti’s inspiration for her book came from her students and becoming an aunt for the first time, which was terrific, and the book is also dedicated to her nephew.
Author’s Bio
Rosella Calauti is with the New York State Public School System. She has managed and taught her high school students daily since 2005 in various Career and technical education courses. Calauti is a career changer who brought worldly knowledge to the classroom and found her passion for working with children. She worked hard to obtain a B.S. degree in fashion and a 2-year degree in Commercial and Fine Arts. She owned and operated a sign business and has experience in the retail art industry. Her journey did not end here. Rosella persevered and attended Manhattanville College, where she earned a Masters in Art Education. She continues to pursue her passion, teaching in the Hudson Valley with Arts and Family and Consumer Sciences certification. She obtained an additional Master in Humanistic and Multicultural Education at SUNY New Paltz. Calauti carries on with her journey committed to education and believes that continuing education must be adhered to reach one’s full potential.