Ma Journée - Mes 100 Premiers Mots

 Published by Scholastic

This book wasn't too bad.  It had a fair number of basic words, some great activities on each page to talk about, and a fun family of cats?  or bears? or something?

 They have some different words AGAIN.  I haven't seen the word "foulard" for scarf in a long time.  It is so frustrating to have so many beginner French books with so many different names for clothes.

Do you say espadrilles?  Or Soulier?  Or Chaussure? Because in English we just say "shoe" and "running shoe".  (and sure, there ARE words like "sneakers" or "wellies", but you don't get into all that nonsense with ESL students under the age of 10.)

I literally looked up the difference between all the terms just now on French Wikipedia, so now I get it, but I have never, in all my years of speaking the language, understood why there were so many terms for one item of clothing.

Back to this book.  The gimmick here is that it has labels for all the items, and when you pull the tab, the labels disappear!  Can you remember their names?

My daughter can't read, so this was useless, but distracting!  And pretty flimsy because it's a library copy, so it's being slowly destroyed.

Anyway, I wasn't that impressed.  I guess I should have learned by now that 100 words isn't actually a lot of words.

Very First French Words

 Published by Collins

I had mixed feelings about this one.  It comes with a CD which is good for parents who don't speak French.  The vocabulary is different than our Usborne French book.  Some of the different vocab is just a personal choice.  For instance, they use "être en collère", and I say "être fâché".  I hate that they sometimes use words that require prepositions when they could easily choose something else because trying to explain French prepositions to a 3 year old is a nightmare.  I learned it by ear because I was in an immersion class and was just copying a teacher that I listened to 7 hours a day.  We don't have that luxury here.

 The art is terrrrrrible.  Very obviously computer assisted.  And I can't stand that stupid monkey.  They were really trying too hard to appeal to the kids.  But they do try to work the vocabulary into a bit of a story and make pages that you can actually talk about in a bit of detail.

Ultimately, though, there just isn't enough to talk about.  The Usborne book has waaaay more vocabulary, and every page is littered with so many details and multiple recurring characters that you could read it forever.  As much as I found this Collins book useful, it wasn't $15 worth of useful.

The Bear's Sea Escape

 By Benjamin Chaud

I was pretty impressed with this book.  The art is charming.  The story is simple.  It's a search and find book with enormous pages.

 The drawings are very "Where's Waldo" style, in that there are little stories everywhere if you look around at the other characters.  But you only have to find the father and baby bears, and it's pretty easy, so it's great for little kids.

There's some weird island stuff, but they don't tell you which island they're going to so it isn't necessarily racist.  I don't think.

I expose my kids to a lot more racist stuff than this.  It's pretty hard to avoid.  I read this book several times with my daughter and didn't mind one bit.

My Red Balloon

 By Kazuaki Yamada

I liked this book when I first read it.

A girl and her balloon get on a bus.  She loses the balloon.  The bus fills with animals and they chase the balloon through the countryside.

 I like the art.  It's very simple.  The balloon is hidden on each page.  My daughter mostly liked it.

In the end the balloon pops.  The girl cries.  They see the sunset and decide that it is a red balloon.

My husband doesn't like it because he thinks it's heavy handed.  My daughter was upset for days, asking me every night why the balloon was gone and where it was and why is it popped.

But I think it could be good for kids who aren't so sensitive.

Picture This

 By Alison Jay

This book isn't half bad.  It has a number of people, toys, animals and objects that are hidden in each page.  The pictures weave together and the story is almost circular and encompasses the four seasons.

 The art style is mid to late nineties.  Each page has cracks on it, like it's been painted on an old plate or something.  It was a trendy look at one time, but it's kind of hokey now.

The words are great for learning to read!  So that's kind of nice.  We're getting into 3 and 4 letter words, but a whole sentence is too tricky.

 My daughter is all like, "WHY ARE ALL THE PAGES BROKEN!  OH NO!"

But, it hasn't caused us any more grief than that.  As a basic picture book for a three year old, it's pretty boring.  I think it's meant for someone at least five years old.  My daughter really didn't understand how one picture led to the other.

One, Two, Where's My Shoe?

 By Tomi Ungerer

Ungerer is a French author whose books sometimes contain a bit of dark humour, and are generally pretty absurd.

This one has almost no text and is just pictures of shoes and boots where you would least expect them.  It's fan-freaking-tastic.

 This page is my favourite.  Find the boots!

Sometimes they're a bit harder to find, but really, this book is less about how tricky the author is and hiding the shoes and more about the joke of swapping out shapes for boots and shoes.

This book is incredibly popular at our house.

Le Grand Livre des Petits Tresors

Written by Nadine Robert
Illustrated by Aki

This book is so fantastic.  First off, it's a book about a boy picking up garbage in the street that he is fascinated with (a beloved pastime of all children), and his grandmother who takes this pastime seriously enough to arrange outings and give him a little backpack to store his treasures in (basically the kind of attention and love that every kid dreams of receiving from an adult).

This is a great book for beginner French kids.  It isn't extensive, like a picture dictionary, or Imagier, but it has general terms for objects, and more specific explanations for them, and even talks a bit about each one in the back.

 The boy and his grandma have lovely little conversations in French, too, which might go over a beginner's head, but are great for a more advanced student.

Best of all, after each excursion, the reader is asked to match up the found object with its origin.

My daughter doesn't have a firm grasp of French, but she's still totally and completely in love with this book.  It has really big pages, really cute pictures, and great variety of vocabulary.  We originally got it out of the library, but after we read it we immediately bought our own copy.

Anno's Journey

 By Mitsumasa Anno

This is a pretty fantastic book that's still in print.  A lot of Mitsumasa's books are not in print, though, which is a crying shame.

They're not really that great as books for very young children.  They're more picture books for older children or, probably more likely, parents.

The detail in each page is incredible; the pictures don't do it justice.  The first page has nothing but ocean and I'm still amazed by it. 

 If you take your time, you'll notice that there is continuity throughout the book and small stories start to emerge.  But the colours are dull, and the details so subtle that most younger kids just won't have the attention span for that.

Some of the details are not geared towards kids, either.

Each Peach Pear Plum

 By Janet and Allan Ahlberg

I feel like this book gets skipped over in favour of "Peepo!"

This one is incredible if only for the continuity.  Look carefully at the map.  The basket of plums.  The landscape in each picture.  All of the characters and scenes fit together.

 Once again, metered rhyming that is actually good, and pictures that are a pleasure to look at.

There's a great search and find element, too.

My copy came with a block puzzle, but it's way too tricky for even a toddler to do.  It's probably suitable for a 4 year old, which is weird, because this is definitely a baby/toddler book.

My First Bilingual Book

 English-French.  There  are a number of books in this series.

You know you're in for trouble when the book is uncredited.

I'm searching high and low for good French teaching tools for my daughter.  This book failed.  It rotates between using "la" and "une" for articles before the noun in order to avoid using the apostrophe before a word beginning with a vowel.

And beyond that, the art is cheap.  So cheap!

We'll use it for a bit, anyway.  There are a few words in these books that aren't in the Usborne book.  But I'd never pay for this crap.

Peepo!

 By Janet and Allan Ahlberg

This is an adorable book.  It has metered rhyme - good rhymes and working rhythm- and gorgeous pictures.

The peep-hole first shows what the baby sees, then as you flip it, it frames the baby on the opposite page.

 If you like, you can get the American version titled "Peek-a-boo!"  You know, if you want me to roll my eyes at you.










The details in each room are fantastic.  Many people consider this to be the ultimate baby book, and it's a fair assessment.  This is a delightful read for babies as well as parents.

How Loud Is a Lion?

 By Stella Blackstone
Illustrated by Clare Beaton

This is a way better Clare Beaton book.  There's a repetitiveness to the narrative that is pleasing.  It lists a lot of African animals, some of which I'm not even familiar with.  The descriptive adjectives are larger than average, so this book is great for vocabulary.

 The pictures are still completely adorable, and you still have to find the lion.

My daughter talks about this book a lot.

Best Counting Book Ever

 By Richard Scarry

(Apologies for the glare over "best" in the picture)

This really IS the best counting book ever.  So many pages of counting... all the way to 100!

 There's a great story from 1 to 10 about the cat family and the pig-firefighters.  Mama cat catches a watermelon!  My daughter is constantly talking about that part of the book at all times of the day.

 Beyond the story at the beginning, there are so many other cute critters to count organized by colour, clothing, activity, vehicle and more.  The animals are organized in groups of 5 or 10, so that you can count multiples.  Brilliant.

At the beginning and end of the book, there are some common equations that you can check out with your child.

This is a long book with many, many pages of counting.  My daughter will sit and flip through the whole thing with delight, even while angrily insisting that there are no numbers after 20.

One Night, Far From Here

 By Julia Wauters

This book has a lot of information in it that is way over a toddler's head, so it's not a good read for someone under the age of 3.

We look through it and I read bits and pieces.  I usually have to skip a lot of it, because my daughter just wants to find the animals and can't be bothered with learning the common name for each species.

The reason she likes the book, other than the fact that it's a big book full of animals, is that the book presents a series of ecosystems made up of layers of clear acetate pages painted with vegetation, so that you have to peel off the layers of the forest, or jungle, or ocean to find hidden creatures.

This is a unique picture book that will be a great story book when she's older.



I would have posted more and better pictures, but there are so many good ones on the publisher's website:  Flying Eye books

Elusive Moose

 By Joan Gannij
Illustrated by Clare Beaton

The story is so-so.  The art is incredible.  These are fabric collages with thread, beads and other notions.  Each page displays an inventive use of embroidery.

 Each page also has a moose hidden in it somewhere.

There are so few pretty board books, it seems.  These books by Clare Beaton are real treasures.  I kind of wish we had actual fabric books like this.  But that would be a ridiculous amount of work.

Everyday Words in French

 Published by Usborne
Models by Jo Litchfield

We've had a lot of fun with this book.  It's been perfect for teaching my daughter some French.  While I did a lot of French in my youth, I have a real hangup about teaching her all of my bad habits.

Having a basic book of vocabulary means that she gets some nouns and adjectives down along with a passable accent and we can work on the finer details -like actually putting together sentences correctly- later on.

The pages contain densely packed messy rooms of things to find and name in French.  There are specific labeled items bordering the scene in case your French isn't up to speed.  There's also a vocabulary list in the back of the book, and some information on how to pronounce the words. There is no English/French dictionary, which is disappointing.

This is an update of a book that was made in the 80's.  I like the art in this newer edition.  It's already dated, however; there are cassettes and CD's everywhere.

As a non-native French speaker, I tend to use France-French and Quebecois terms at random.  Sometimes the term in the book isn't the same as the one I use.  There doesn't seem to be any information in the book about how they chose their words, but I would assume that they stuck to France-French.

Within 4 months of using this book 3-5 times a week at bedtime, my daughter knew all of her colours, most of her bugs, almost everything on the food page (she loves food) and a handfull of household objects.  Within 6 months she was counting to 10, among other things.  And that's without speaking French in the daytime.

Animal Hide and Seek

 By Dahlov Ipcar

This is another excellent Ipcar book.  The text is a little advanced.  We're just starting to read it properly.  As a picture book, though, it's great for kids under 3.

 This is a search and find book in green, orange and brown.  The animals are native to Maine, but we live in a similar climate and have most of the same animals living in our backyard.  The colours are dull, but accurate for the species presented as well as their habitat.

We all love this book.  My daughter gets so excited finding the animals.  Sure, lions and tigers and elephants are cool, but we see ducks and deer in our back yard all the time, so it's especially exciting to read a book about them.