Brian McClure has written a children's' book that works beautifully on two levels. In gentle rhyming prose he tells that story of a raindrop as it travels though the water cycle. A single raindrop that goes from cloud to the deep dry earth and then into the growing corn field. He realizes he was never useless but an important part of a greater system. It is a wonderful tool for teaching the role the water cycle plays in maintaining the world.

But it is the book's message that comes through loud and clear.  It is the interconnectedness of the raindrop with the world, the lesson to children that they are each a part of a whole. It emphasizes that each child, each person is a "Great gift to the World." As the raindrop says to the cloud, "You are part of the process of life, and not just a prop."  More information is available through the author's Universal Flag Web site.

This book is appropriate as a teaching lesson on both levels, both as a home discussion piece and as part of a school , kindergarten or first grade, lesson on water cycles.

Buddy Plumee's full page illustrations are a well matched addition to the flow of the story.