With very few words, Leslie Patricelli has been able to capture the absolute glee found in the abandon of childhood swinging. A little girl clad in a pink striped dress, matching shoes and pigtails never loses her smile as her father pushes her as the title says—Higher! Higher!

The book begins before it begins—on the dedication page, we can see the young girl running towards the swing, already smiling with joy as her father follows behind. On the title page, Dad starts pushing the girl and her incredible journey begins.

While most of the dialogue is simply the girl calling out, “Higher! Higher!” to her father, Patricelli’s fun, friendly artwork tell the rest of the story in this inviting tale. Dad is soon far away, below the girl and visible from a bird’s-eye view as she encounters taller and taller creatures and landscapes. A smiling giraffe, a trio of rooftop children, a mountain-climber, an airplane and even a rocket featuring a grinning monkey (or a chimpanzee, if your child is like mine and insists it’s one of the Space Chimps) all wave at the girl on her swing as she is suspended—you guessed it—higher and higher.

As she passes the earth’s atmosphere, who does she run into but a fellow swinging child—only instead of someone from Earth—which is clearly visible way down below the child—it is an adorable one-eyed, green alien that sort of resembles a cross between the alien squeaky toys in Toy Story and a Christmas elf. His planet is also clearly visible from below. Both are grinning, happy as can be as their parents push them higher and higher. They greet each other, give one another a high-five, and wave goodbye.

The girl then begins her descent back to Earth, happily passing all of the wonderful people and creatures she met on her journey, and is caught by her smiling father only to say the word that we’ve all heard when pushing our children at the playground—“Again!”

It really is an adorable story, but it also has some great educational opportunities. My preschooler, for example, is just learning to follow words with her fingers. After a few instances, she was able to point out “higher” and other words in the book. It only contains six or seven words (depending on if you count the word “swing” used on the dedication page or not), making it perfect to introduce several new words for beginning readers.

It also provides a great way to get kids to tell their own stories. With no written descriptions provided, children can make up what’s happening, what the girl is thinking, where the places she visits are located, etc. It’s an imaginary adventure that’s also so brief that parents probably won’t mind reading it a few times over again.