Little Mouse’s Encyclopedia: A Picture Book about the Wonders of Nature

Little Mouse’s Encyclopedia is exactly what the subtitle says it is: A Picture Book about the Wonders of Nature. Other adjectives that could be applied are beautifully illustrated, humorous, informative, and charming.

Little Mouse’s Encyclopaedia was originally published in the Czech Republic and won the Golden Ribbon Award for children’s nonfiction. The narrative cleverly explores the world through the eyes a curious young mouse who loves to read encyclopedias and decides to record her nature observations in an encyclopedia of her own.

What a perfect lead-in to a myriad of nature activities for young students.

I observe what’s happening around my burrow, I can write down my findings and draw little diagrams…I know, I’ll make my own encyclopedia!

Little Mouse’s Encyclopedia is organized into four sections: “Around the Burrow”, “The Forest”, “The Pond”, and “The Garden”. In addition to identifying different plants and animals that live in each of these four ecosystems, Little Mouse also helps the readers learn about food chains, the role of decomposers, what tree rings tell us, different bird songs, breathing underwater, and much more.

Little Mouse poses numerous questions as she records her observations. For example, on a page illustrating Little Mouse with a picnic cloth spread with 16 fruits and vegetables, Little Mouse asks, “Which are fruits and vegetables?” The answers are shown upside down at the bottom of the page.

The book also includes numerous hands-on activities for further study. Most of these will probably involve the guidance of an adult, but there is more than enough information to whet young nature scientists’ curiosity to investigate further, such as “How to make a herbarium”, “Studying aquatic organisms”, “Making a pond in the garden”, and “Growing aromatic plants”.

Vostradovská’s art work beautifully combines the fictional story of the creation of Little Mouse’s encyclopedia with scientific terminology so that even young readers are becoming familiar with the correct terminology.

For example, webbing — the membranes stretched between fingers — encourages the use of legs as fins.

Although there is no table of contents, index, or glossary, there is one additional resource identified at the end of this book. It is the “fun video game and interactive encyclopedia available in 18 different languages”.

I eagerly anticipate sharing fun nature adventures with the curious young people with whom I intend to share this book. Whatever your role, teacher, librarian, parent, caregiver, grandparent, I highly recommend getting a copy of Little Mouse’s Encyclopedia and letting the fun, and learning, begin.