Listening As Love: The Emotional Power of a Simple Picture Book
By Leah Nevills, Customer Service Assistant, Children’s Department, Central Library
Book Review: The Rabbit Listened by Cori Doerrfeld
This book is one I recommend to all parents with little ones who are learning how to regulate their emotions. Children don't know how to do that on their own. They need help from the caretakers around them to either model healthy emotion regulation or give them resources, like children's books, to show what that looks like.
This book is excellent at its portrayal of what it's like for kids to feel disappointment and how to process that feeling. The story starts with a little boy who builds a tower with blocks. The tower falls and the boy is very upset. Each page shows a different animal coming to the boy and offering him advice on how to handle his anger, frustration, and disappointment at his now knocked down tower. For example, one animal tells him to just clean it up and go do something else, while another animal tells him to go knock down someone else's tower to make himself feel better. All the animals offer him advice except one, the rabbit.
The rabbit sits next to him and waits. Eventually, the boy starts talking about his feelings and about all the advice he's been given. The rabbit just listens. Once the boy is finished talking about his feelings, he realizes that he has the ability to think of his own solution. The theme of this book is that sometimes when bad things happen to us, we just need someone to validate our feelings and listen to what we have to say. It shows children that there are things that just happen, and we can't control them, like the tower falling.
We may not be able to control the situation, but we can control how we react to it. This book teaches kids it's okay to be upset or disappointed or angry. We have to process and feel those emotions in order to move on. And just like the boy in the story, we can think of solutions once we're calmer and have expressed our feelings.
This book is one I've read countless times to little ones, and it can be a great tool for parents during outbursts or meltdowns. I’ve sat next to multiple children having big feelings and asked, "Do you need me to be the rabbit right now?" It helps all of us de-escalate and think about what made us upset in the first place, rather than focusing on our heightened states. If this book seems helpful or interesting to you, here are a few more recommendations:
In My Heart: A Book of Feelings by Jo Witek
The Color Monster by Anna Llenas
My Mouth is a Volcano by Julia Cook
My Heart by Corinna Luyken
As an adult who has read these books to children, I can say they’ve even helped me with regulating my own emotions. When kids and caretakers learn together it can be beautiful and such a relief to have tools and resources to access when we need help processing and expressing our feelings.