Blog Tour: Step into my Shoes
Today, I am very happy to be taking part in the Blog Tour for ‘Step into my Shoes’, a lovely picture book from Lantana, which paves the way for plenty of discussion!
Matou lives just outside Paris, in a place she dismissively thinks no one has ever heard of. Now that her mum works in the city, she walks to and from school by herself. One Friday, having been let out of school early, as she passes the mosque, she notices a ‘sea of shoes’, including a pair of sports shoes with orange laces. Tempted by the fact they are nearly her size, she tries them on. Having returned them, she notices the boy the shoes belong to and concludes the shoes are pristine because he doesn’t walk much. From then on, Matou regularly tries on different shoes outside the mosque and ponders on the lives of their owners until one day, excited by the fact that her mother will be home early, she goes straight home…only to become upset as her mother arrives late. But when she steps into her mother’s shoes, she gains a new perspective, learning what it truly means to ‘step into someone’s shoes’.
‘Step into my Shoes’ is a wonderful story for developing empathy and compassion. Matou literally explores the expression ‘to step into someone else’s shoes’, initially as a way of entertaining herself on her journey home, but ultimately coming to understand her mother better. Children will really relate to her curiosity as she wonders about all the footwear left outside the mosque as those inside pray. Initially, for those unfamiliar with this custom, there will be conversations about this practice, offering opportunities to deepen understanding - and make links with other religions and cultural traditions.
But the real joy of the story is that it encourages readers to pause and think - no matter how frustrated, angry or upset- that misunderstandings can be seen from another perspective and that ‘stepping into someone else’s shoes’ allows us to understand them better, an important lesson which many adults could do with learning! The illustrations add much to the text, making it easy for children to choose different pairs of shoes and explore their ideas about the owners and to pause and consider Matou’s feelings at different points in the story. Interest in France might also be piqued by various details in the pictures- the Eiffel Tower, Sacre-Coeur, the pyramid of the Louvre, signs for the Metro, the shop names, Lautrec’s Black Cat, the Mona Lisa- there is much to explore!
A lovely book to spend time with!
Step into my Shoes
Alkisti Halikia, translated by Konstantine Matsoukas, illustrated by Fotini Tikkou
Lantana ISBN: 978-1915244956