Author Matthew Paul Turner (of When God Made You) talks about his new children’s book and leaving room for science and questions within his rhymes.
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Awesome! I look forward to reading this book. 
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This books sounds really nice indeed.
I especially like the ecological and environmental aspects to it such as making kids see that if our creator made this world for us then should we not also help care for it. That’s one of the things I’m most passionate about and I’m always focused on with my niece and nephew. It started out by showing them Gods creation in plants. Then I begin to show them insects with the host species. That evolved o to native edible plants and some mushrooms. They are starting to branch out on their own and what they are interested in. Especially my niece who is only 10 but uses her allowance to buy bird watching books and she sits in her room and looks out window and watches for birds and try to find them in her books. She’s really gotten into fairy gardens lately.
With the native edible plants I find it’s a great way to show them how to be thankful to a God for food. Many of us grow up saying prayers over our food and it can just become almost a superficial mantra I believe so I enjoy taking them and we hike for hours in the early morning before breakfast and try to find 2-3 edible plants. At least one. Then by the time we get back and cook it we are hungry and I feel it helps them really appreciate it and realize that God made this earth and it provides for us and we need to be thankful. No other planet that we know of provides food for us in any way. It helps them understand the importance of caring for the land. My niece goes out and picks wild onions and coastal ground cherries late spring almost every weekend lol. I tell her to always get pictures of the plants on her phone even if she’s knows what it is and try to show her easily identifiable ones. I don’t encourage them to pick mushrooms without me though they both know lions mane and oyster mushrooms really well. It’s hard to mistake those for others where we are.
These are the last of my wild onions and oyster mushrooms that I have lol. Just cooked them all tonight except for the final largest oyster mushroom but I can basically go find those anytime I want around here within 45 minutes typically.
But I do look forward to getting that book at some point for them.
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Thank you for sharing! Added it to my Amazon shopping list after reading several reviews. I am particularly appreciative of the stewardship angle the book takes.
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UPDATE:
I just finished reading the book to my three year old son. He LOVED it! I also loved it. I’m glad that the book incorporated children of color and different cultures, and one of them was even disabled. The book also touched on lots of animals and on the universe, and I think it was fairly mild in terms of evolutionary language–this book could really be read to any Christian child, I think, as long as you don’t have misgivings about the word “evolve” or the phrase “perhaps over time”.
Finally, I liked the ecological stewardship concepts touched on in the book, as this is very important to me and my wife. I recommend!
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Thanks for your review! I’m glad you enjoyed it.
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