Entries Tagged 'books' ↓

Tiger by Nick Butterworth
Ezri loved flipping the pages on this one. She kept saying, “tiger,” each time after I read the word tiger which occurs often in the book. I don’t think she got the concept of the plot which is that a small, orange, stripy kitten named Tiger is pretending he is an actual TIGER. But she liked pointing at the cat in the book and saying tiger, so it was a success. She also liked the page with the tiger’s ROAR on it. Anything where the reader makes interesting noises is a plus.

Her utterance for book has gained its ‘k” sound at the end and now sounds remarkably like the standard American English pronunciation of “book.”
She requests books by name now. She is my bibliophile.

Oops! by David Shannon ( A Diaper David Book)
Eric has been reading this one at bedtime A LOT lately. Luckily, it’s short.
Each two page spread features the baby, David, doing something with one of his first spoken words and his reaction to the situation.
For example, there is a picture of him with his ball thrown through a low window that says “Ball” on one page and “Uh-oh” on the other page.
There’s an illustration of a dog covered in macaroni next to a high chair where the reader sees only one of David’s dangling feet. The word on one page is “Dog” and the other “Oops!”
There’s an illustration of “Bath” with naked David saying “Ahh!”
The last illustration shows a sleeping David nestled against mom’s shoulder with “Mama” on one page and “Zzzzzzz” on the other.
There’s a lot of attitude captured in the illustrations with just a few words. Ezri likes to say “uh-oh” and “whee” along with the book. We will have to check out the companion book Oh, David! soon.

Summertime and the living’s easy. . .

Ezri has signed up for her library’s summer reading club.
It is MAD SCIENCE themed. There is a lot to look at with the whole room decorated with experiments, lab rodents, and mad scientists turning it into the LIBAROTORY.

Ezri has added her lab rat to the maze.

She’s been signed up as member #1 by Miss Rachel in a lab coat and big black geeky glasses. Ezri wasn’t the first to sign up as we had some morning errands, but the librarians let her be #1 in the database of members – an honor. It also strikes me that library programs may be the one place that I won’t have to spell Ezri’s name when I register her.

Here is Ezri’s pal, Meghan, dressed as a lab rat.

We selected some books to read.

The whole process was so exciting that it tuckered Ezri out and she had a good nap afterward.

Ezri and her family recommend public library summer reading clubs to everyone. I will be signing up for the adult club.

Hop, Skip, Jump: A Very First Picture Book by Nicola Tuxworth:
This book has photos of young children (up to about 5 years old) moving. There’s marching, skipping, jumping, throwing and other styles of movement. What Ezri likes best about this book is pointing to body parts. She loves to say “knee” lately as it is one of her more accurately pronounced words. This means pointing out the knees in these photos is particularly fun. She also points to the hair, eyes, bellies and toes of the children in the photos. The photographs are great for this game where I ask her to “point to an ear.” She points to an ear. Then I ask her to “point to a mouth.” The game goes on until she is bored and onto other things. The children photographed in the book are racially diverse. The backgrounds have been edited out of the photos so the children stand against a white background which makes it easy to focus on the children and leaves an uncluttered page. This clean design seems easier for Ezri. There are other titles in the series we will have to check out including Food, Funny Faces, Baby Animals, Splish Splash, Wild Animals, Kittens, Machines at Work, and Farm Animals.

Ezri realizes sound comes out of the earbuds which she had previously supposed were for chewing.

The Baby Goes Beep by Rebecca O’Connell with pictures by Ken Wilson-Max.
Onomatopoeia is big right now developmentally speaking. We visited Cosley Zoo. Ezri saw a cow and said, “moo! moo!” When she falls she says “boom.” She likes it when I imitate the sound of the wind chimes – “ting-a-ling.” Ezri likes to hear “bring-bring” for the phone and “hisssssss” for her snake puppet. This love of sounds made the book The Baby Goes Beep perfect for her. It’s text is very simple and rhythmically repetitious. “The baby goes Yum. The baby goes Yum Yum. The baby goes Yum Yum Yum Yum.” The illustrations show scenes taking the reader through baby’s day from riding in the car with “beep” to bedtime with “shh.” The repeated sentences make reading this feel like chanting and it’s hard not to develop a strong cadence. I can tell this book is successful because she will listen repeatedly and I am happy to reread it for her.

Build it up!

Knock it down.

My Body by Heidi Johansen from PowerKids Press. This book hit perfectly with Ezri. It is a board book with pictures of babies with one body part highlighted. For example, one page has a baby sleeping and there is a blow up of that baby’s ear next to the baby with the words, “My ear.” Pretty simple, but Ezri is just learning the names of her body parts and reveled in pointing to them in the book and then on herself and then on her baby doll. The photo enlargements let her know exactly which body part was a knee or a hand in a way other body books haven’t. I don’t think she understands what an arrow in a graphic means yet, so the enlargements worked where other body books didn’t. The ending page with “my smile” may be lost on her at this point, but I can see I slightly older child liking the ending with the smiling baby.

Peek-A-Boo What? by Begin Smart Books is a board book with full page sized flaps. Like other books (Peek-a-who? by Nina Laden comes to mind) it rhymes peek-a-boo with another phrase underneath the flap. So, for example, the top of the flap says “peek-a-boo” and you lift to get “peek-a-two” with a colorful illustration of two dogs. The flaps have holes where the O’s in “peek-a-boo” are. Ezri can easily open the flaps and likes the bright illustrations. Like other Begin Smart books, which are designed by a team rather than created by a single artist or writer, the book feels more serviceable than inspired. These books won’t be the ones that have life into her preschool years, but Begin Smart does a good job of knowing what interests the toddler/baby and they are publishing books just for babies. We have several other books by them in Ezri’s library and I anticipate picking up more at the library.

In other developments, Ezri has started to sing. In addition to her adorable dancing, we are now treated to a rendition of the alphabet song. It starts ABC and there are other letters that follow and it has a tune. She sings other songs we can’t quite make out, but it’s cool to hear her singing.

Re: the photo
With the carseat in the car Ezri is not that interested in sitting in it. She’s usually pretty good about being strapped in, but it isn’t her favorite.
When the carseat is on the porch, Ezri loves sitting in it and climbing on it and treating it like her easy chair.

Eric pointed out that our outfits on this day matched. I am reading to Ezri from It Does Not Say Meow by Beatrice Schenk de Regniers. This book was originally published in the early 1970s. There is a rhyming riddle on one page that describes an animal. You turn the page to see if you guessed the animal correctly. The book has aged well with the exception of one illustration of white children dressed up as Indians that is disrespectful of Native American culture if emblematic of its time. Ezri particularly likes the illustration of the cat and the frog. It is nice that the book does not need to be read in order, because Ezri pages through willy nilly at the moment flipping here and there. She spends a long time on one page and then flips quickly past the next. She wants to be the one in charge of turning the pages. She can also be redirected from other play by being asked to go get a book to read from the shelf. She likes selecting her own books.

The other book I want to mention is Ten Little Fingers & Ten Little Toes by Mem Fox and illustrated by Helen Oxenbury. The rhyming text is simple, gentle, and warm. I am reading this one a lot right before naptime as its rhythm is good for calm moments and its message is reassuring. Ezri is often in her crib relaxing while I read this and thus does not see the pictures. Though, when she is in my lap she does like to point out the fingers and toes on the babies in the illustrations. Oxenbury’s baby illustrations border on too cute, but they aren’t over the edge for me. I find I replace the pronoun “it” with “her” when reading the final few pages about the baby that is mine all mine.

Ezri’s friend, Julia, trying to put Ezri into her lap for storytime which is just funny because they are practically the same size. Julia’s a year older and wiser.

Ezri is now reading bath books. We read Sandra Boynton’s waterproof wonder Barnyard Bath in which the reader is invited to scrub various barnyard animals with her washcloth. The final page tells the reader now it’s time to scrub you and the back cover thanks the reader for getting clean. The rhyme is simple the action of scrubbing the pages is fun and it is a perfect way to combine working on literacy and cleanliness.  Plus, it is opportunity to make some barnyard animal noises and what toddler doesn’t like that?

At naptime sometimes I read Ezri a story while she is in her crib not quite asleep.
Today we enjoyed Ten Little Fingers and Ten Little Toes by Mem Fox with illustrations by Helen Oxenbury.

Ezri liked the repetitive refrain and I think it did help her relax. She also likes to point out the fingers and toes in the illustrations when I say those words. She says “hi” to the babies in the book as well.

The photo has her in her wagon with her favorite Clifford phonics reader.

Another impressive development of the last week is puppet skills.  Ezri knows puppets go on hands and she will request to have her spider puppet put on her hand.  Then she will wave it around.  She also likes to make her baby dolls dance.  This involves wiggling them around on the floor to music.

Ezri really enjoys turning the pages and looking at the book Get That Lunch Box by Donna Taylor.  It is a phonics reader I picked up for free somewhere and it features Clifford the Big Red Dog.  I think it is her like of the color red and her advancing abilities turning the pages of non-board books that make this a favorite rather than any literary appeal.  She doesn’t actually want it read to her.  She just wants to turn pages and carry it around with her.

Where’s My Sweetie Pie? by Ed Emberley is a book Ezri enjoys having read to her.  She also seems to want it read from front to back.  She sits for the whole thing and lifts the flaps on each page.  On each page the reader lifts flaps looking for the sweetie pie.  “Behind this log?  It’s a happy frog! But where’s my sweetie pie?”  A log shaped flap covers a happy frog as one would expect.  The final page features a locket in a pocket and inside the locket is a mirror and inside the mirror Ezri can see that she is my sweetie pie.  She tends to kiss herself on in the mirror (or maybe lick, but it’s a friendly gesture).  This book is a nice concept well executed with simple flaps and bright illustrations.

What Am I? a Look & See book from Sterling Publishing.  It’s all about the concentric holes that decrease in size with each page that create the eyes of the animals in this book.  Ezri’s little fingers love feeling the holes and poking through them.  The stylized animals channel a bit of a 70s vibe for me.  Ezri likes to hoo-hoo on the owl page and hiss on the snake page.   It is a guessing book with a riddle on one side of the spread and the animal on the other.  The riddles are pleasantly written and readable.  This one has been read and played with mulitple times.