I'm not crazy about the illustrations, but the story falls in the great trickster tradition which is always fun. And there's a dance-y refrain that's easy to learn and repeat. ( )

Rabbit loved to dance, day and night. He also loved to dance with his friends, but they don't enjoy it as much because Rabbit does it all the time! They even start to hide from him! One day, Rabbit goes to dance with his friends but they aren't there. Oh no! They've been captured by the fox. Rabbit saves the day, can you guess how? Dancing! He uses his dance to outsmart the fox! Very cute story for toddlers. The moral of the story can sure teach a lot of students. ( )

A story about a happy little rabbit that dances all day long. His friends find it annoying until one day they are able to join together and dance away from a prowling fox. It's a cute story with a little song that could be fun for young students to learn and dance along. ( )

Dance Away was a blast to use in storytime, although it's perhaps a bit long for the toddler crowd. However it worked beautifully for my preschool kids and I think could extend up through 1st grade or so. Rabbit loves to dance. He loves it so much in fact that he's making his friends a little crazy - until they're captured by a fox that is! How Rabbit uses dancing to escape the fox is silly and giggle inducing - the kids loved it. Throughout the book Rabbit's dancing song is repeated over and over again: "Left two three kick right two three kick, left skip right skip, turn around!" While brave storytime leaders could create a tune for Rabbit's song, I chose to chant it which seemed to work fine. My preschool audience started reciting the song with me about halfway through the book and one little girl even attempted to perform the steps while sitting on her bottom. This would be a great interactive book if you had the space, although the format is probably too small to be used with more than fifteen or so kids. It occurs to me that this could also be really fun Readers' Theater for older kids - 2nd or 3rd grade or so. The illustrations, by Jose Aruego and Ariane Dewey, are uncluttered and clearly express Rabbit's joy in dancing. The focus is definitely on the characters and the dancing with several spreads having no background at all besides a base color. Dance Away worked perfectly for my dance-themed storytime, but it would also work well for a rabbit theme, a trickster theme or a music theme. The CIP information includes a note that "Rabbit's dance can be done to any schottische or any other music in 2/4 or 4/4 time."

Used for dance-themed storytime in 3/2009; Terrific Ts and Preschool ST on 3/24 and Family ST 3/26. ( )

the rabbit like dancing too much that his friend try to get away from him. One day the rabbit come upon his friends who got caught by the fox. The rabbit quickly using his dancing skill to rescue his friends and himself from the fox. This book is good for little kid with simple singing tune. ( )