If you think of the brain as a ‘clues closet’, books have lots of clues in all kinds of styles. Even very young children listening to adults read to them can use clues. Pictures are an obvious set of clues. Children can often figure out the basic action of a story just by looking at the pictures. More clues are the usual pattern of beginning, middle and end often that are in many, if not most, stories. The kind of vocabulary is another clue, for instance, books that start out telling about a color on one page, are followed by pages of other colors. Counting books have words and numbers. Problems presented at the start have a solution at the end. The same people or characters continue from page to page. All these are parts of books that we take for granted but they all help develop the thinking and learning and kindergarten readiness of kids. But these clues will never need washing, ironing and don’t wear out! What’s in yours?