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In My Heart Front Cover

In My Heart: A Book of Feelings

(9781419713101)

Written by Jo Witek

Illustrated by Christine Roussey

Published by Abrams Appleseed

Theme/topic: Health and Physical Education

In My Heart: A Book of Feelings by Jo Witek is a beautifully illustrated story that explores a wide range of emotions in a way that is accessible to young children. The book follows a young girl as she describes how different feelings manifest in her heart—whether it flutters with happiness, feels heavy with sadness, or pounds with excitement.

Through expressive language and vivid imagery, the book helps children recognise, name, and understand their emotions, supporting their ability to describe how their body reacts to different feelings and situations (AC9HPFP03, ACPPS005 – Foundation Year, Health and Physical Education). The engaging die-cut heart illustrations add a tactile element, reinforcing the idea that emotions come in many forms and are a natural part of life. In My Heart is a valuable resource for fostering emotional literacy, encouraging self-awareness, and promoting discussions about feelings in a comforting and relatable way.

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Curriculum Alignment:

  • These AC codes are suggested purely based on the book’s content and are provided for reference only.

AC9HPFP03 9.0 (Health and Physical Education Foundation): Express and describe emotions they experience

• identifying and describing the emotions of people who are happy, sad, excited, tired, angry, scared or confused
• learning and using appropriate language and actions to communicate their feelings in different situations
• recalling and sharing emotional responses to different situations and representing these in a variety of ways
• reading and viewing stories about adventures, and talking about how characters feel and react when taking risks or responding to emergencies
• talking about connections between feelings, body reactions and body language
• expressing a variety of emotions, thoughts and views in a range of situations

ACPPS005 8.4 ( Foundation): Identify and describe emotional responses people may experience in different situations

• identifying and describing the emotions of people who are happy, sad, excited, tired, angry, scared or confused
• learning and using appropriate language and actions to communicate their feelings in different situations
• recalling and sharing emotional responses to different situations and representing this in a variety of ways
• reading and viewing stories about adventures and talking about how characters feel and react when taking risks
• talking about connections between feelings, body reactions and body language
• exploring how someone might think and feel during an emergency

Starring the same little girl in the same charming illustration style as Hello In There!, In My Heart explores emotions–happiness, sadness, bravery, anger, shyness and more.

Unlike other feelings books that tend to oversimplify, In My Heart lyrically explains what an emotion feels like, physically, inside. For example: “When I get really angry, my heart feels like it’s going to explode! Don’t come near me! My heart is yelling, hot and loud. This is when my heart is mad.”

Toddlers will be empowered by this new vocabulary and able to practice articulating and identifying their own emotions. On the cover and the right side of each spread, a die-cut heart decreases in size, creating a multi-coloured heart the depth of the entire book.

Winner of 2018 Read for Empathy Guide list 2018

“Witek covers an impressive emotional range while Roussey’s childlike drawings evoke each feeling with a playful style.”

“…evocative imagery, popping with bright colors against the effectively used white background.” –Kathleen Kelly MacMillan, Carroll County Public Library, MD”School Library Journal” (12/01/2014)

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