Baby Steve: The Hat That Went Around the World

Sylvia Pantaleo is an assistant professor of education specializing in
children’s literature at Queen’s University. She is the co-author of
Learning with Literature in the Canadian Elementary Classroom.

A hat at an airport dreams of going outside and seeing the big wide
world. “A friend who was about to leave said, ‘You can have this
baby, Steve.’” Hence the hat is named Baby Steve. The hat travels
around the world and wherever it goes, it asks the animal inhabitants
“What is the world?” Each creature has a different reply and Baby
Steve learns that “All things are different, all are the same. Many
things just have a different name.” In the end, Baby Steve returns to
the airport.

The author uses rhyming couplets to tell the story of Baby Steve’s
adventures. Unfortunately, on numerous pages the rhyming is forced and
there is a loss of rhythm; the phrasing is often awkward and unnatural
and, overall, the writing is pedestrian. The message of the text is
didactic and problematic: Are all things different? Are all things the
same? Children will have difficulty understanding how the message of the
text is derived from the answers given by the animals. Finally, there is
an illustration error on page 23: the illustration shows a lion,
rhinoceroses, and elephants; the text refers to “lions, hippos and
elephants.” Not recommended.