Puffin Books Junior Books
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Revolting Rhymes - Roald Dahl
by broxi3781 We like books that are different - and enjoy those with a dark sense of humour. A number of people from a home ed group said this would suit us perfectly. A bit of further research showed this book appears regularly on banned books lists being considered "corrosive to young minds". So in other words - it was a perfect addition ... to my collection. In this book, Roald Dahl takes six traditional nursery tales and re invents them with his uniquely wicked wit. The stories are told in rhyme, and this has been described as poems about the fairy tale characters. This description is fair, but I would point out that these are complete stories as well - just told in a poetic style. I am not sure if doggerel is the correct term for these - they are crude and in a sense common - but they are also very well measured and flow perfectly. If you are used to modern sanitised fairy tales for children - you may be in for a shock. Not everyone lives happily ever after in this book and some very young children may be upset. I would suggest this book for ages 4-8, but of course it depends completely upon the child. Just be aware that there will be violence and death - as well as one word parents mightn't wish there little ones to repeat - "slut". The stories: Cinderella: This is my favourite. The original Cinderella was censored as unfit for children because it has some gory scenes with toes and heels being chopped off. Nothing like that in this story - instead it is heads being chopped off. But there is a bit of moral to this as the princess sees the princes true colours and wishes for a decent man instead. I'm afraid some women do grow up searching for Prince Charming - how much better to look for someone kind and decent instead. Jack and the Beanstalk: Not too much different from the original tale except that it is much more violent and Jack learns a lesson about taking baths. Snow White: A very modern twist on this story. There is no prince to save the day - Snow White relies on her own wit instead. Goldilocks and the Three Bears: This story describes Goldilocks as "a brazen little crook". She is crass and rude. She gobbles up the porridge, breaks Baby Bears chair - uttering a word so rude that the author states " I dare not write it, even hint it. Nobody would ever print it". Little Red Riding Hood: There is just a slight twist in this tale - Little Red keeps a loaded pistol safely tucked away inside her knickers. How does this change the outcome ? Read it yourself and find out. The Three Little Pigs: If you have the original Brothers Grimm tale - this one isn't too far off. It contains all of the violence and then some. Things really start to change when the wold can not get blow down the house of bricks. But if he can't blow it down - why not blow it up? Wolf threatens to get dynamite - and Pig calls Little Red. Illustrations: Our edition is printed on a smooth white paper with colour illustrations. These are somewhat roughly drawn, and without the colour, would be more of the type of illustration I would expect in a paperback chapter book, but they suit the story well, and I do feel the colour really is an improvement. Please be aware that other editions are only black and white line drawings. My Opinion: As an adult, I have to admit I found this book highly entertaining. It really is a funny twist on these traditional tales. There are certainly some aspects I can see might upset a younger child, and there is quite a lot of death, but it certainly makes its point. One thing I found unique about this book is the female characters. these are not damsels in distress awaiting a knight in shining armour. These are strong confident women - although one might qualify as a bit of a homicidal maniac. If you are tired of females being portrayed as the weaker sex in children's literature - you simply must give this a try. I do like the way this is told in rhyming format as well. I am aware how important rhyming is in reading development, but it is unusual to find a book with rhymes that will appeal to older children. As much as I like the inclusion of rhyme for educational purposes though, I do think the story comes first and have no use for books that sacrifice story line for rhyme. This does not. The story flows perfectly and the rhymes just add another touch. I do realise this book would not be suitable for all children. Some parents are going to be offended by the gratuitous levels of violence, others by the use of slightly offensive word. More importantly though - some children will be upset by the deaths of some characters, If you have read the traditional Brothers Grimm - this isn't much worse but if your child is young enough to be upset at storybook deaths - I would definitely recommend waiting on this one. There are several videos on you tube with these stories being read so if you wish to preview before buying - I suggest looking these up. My sons opinions: My children are ages 7 and 4. The oldest laughed his socks at a few points and certainly enjoyed the humour, but he has reached a stage where he rarely likes reading the same books over and over, so - he read it , it was grand, he is finished with it. My youngest did like some stories but he didn't really like the high level of death. he doesn't mind the bad guys getting killed, but even though he does understand this isn't real, he prefers for the good characters to survive. Nonetheless, he was delighted by references to knickers, and enjoyed the murder spree in one story as well. His favourite without a doubt though was Goldilocks and the Three Bears, and he will often read this one without the rest. The very best part of this story centers around dog poo. Poo is a perennial favourite in our home. Overall my sons would only give this 4 stars, but I am going to up this time to 5. I think underneath the poo, bloodshed and very naughty humour, there are some very real issues here which are addressed quite well, and I also value this book simply because it is unique. I do not normally include details like this as I feel you can look them up by clicking the Amazon link. In this case, the amazon link will take you to the black and white version - and I do feel the colour edition is better. This can be more difficult to find. I bought mine from ebay at roughly £2.50, and having just checked see a number of used copies @ £2.49 with free postage. However, I can not find this in paperback with Amazon but I do see a used hardcover version for £2.81. Our book is 7" x9", white with yellow trim and a yellow corner with a puffin. A Picture Puffin Book c. 1982 Jonathan Cape ltd. ISBN # 9780140504231 Hardback version : ISBN-10: 0224029320 Read the complete review |
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The Very Hungry Caterpillar - Eric Carle
by broxi3781 There are some books which become dated with time and others which are timeless. The Very Hungry Caterpillar was first printed in 1969 - but I feel it will still be just as relevant in 2069. It has been reprinted in a wide variety of formats including hardback, paperback, finger puppet edition and cloth book. Our copy is a board book, ... which I feel is an ideal format for this book - but I have just learned that a touch and feel version is in the works and available for pre order - but no release date is given. On avaerage one copy of this book in some form sells every 30 seconds with over 33 million sold. The Very Hungry Caterpillar has a very simple story. It simply chronicles the life of a caterpillar from a very tiny egg, to a small and very hungry caterpillar who eats and eats and eats. I think most readers will forgive me if I forgo my usual spoiler alert with this book - but if you really do not know what becomes of caterpillars you might want to stop reading and just buy the book - and several others on Key Stage 1 science. The book begins with a little egg on a leaf with a gentle anthropomorphic moon watching over it. One morning the egg hatches - with a pop! The little caterpillar wakes up and goes in search of food. The next 5 pages are of different sizes so that you see one of each of the five types of fruit the little caterpillar will eat over the next five days. As he grows his appetite grows. On the first day he eats one apple, on the next day he has two pears and so on. On the 6th day he makes a right pig of himself and eats all sorts of food including quite a bit of junk food and doesn't feel very well at all. Finally he eats one leaf and now that he is big and fat he is ready to build is cocoon and reemerge as a butterfly. This is another book I underrated looking at this from an adult prospective. I felt the pictures were a bit crude, and the story a bit boring. I bought this only because it is so highly recommended on home education sites and I wanted to see what all the fuss was about. Reading this with a child I soon came to see the value of the book. My oldest son had this book memorised very quickly, just as his brother would later. Both boys especially liked the "pop" as the caterpillar came out of his egg and the chorus of "But he was still hungry." Which my youngest could repeat well before age 2 - or shout out whenever he finished his own food and wanted more. Each piece of fruit has a tiny hole, which is really too small for even a tiny finger to fit through, but they did love poking at this. For this reason I feel the board book is best, but I would happily pay more for a much larger version with larger holes. I was all set to buy the finger puppet versions when thankfully another reviewer here mentioned that it does not containing the whole story - just the fruit - what a dud. As my children have grown this book falls in and out of favour. They grow bored with it for awhile, but it always comes back out again. No matter how long it sits on the shelf they always remember every word, and my oldest did use this book as well in learning to read, and again when learning the days of the week. For all that this is a well loved book, it did reduce my youngest to tears and he simply could not be comforted. It took me totally by surprise as my children enjoy many scary stories and books which might upset another child. I never dreamed this book would leave him crying his eyes out. He didn't want the caterpillar to change and seemed to regard it as a kind of death. I tried explaining that the caterpillar would be happy as a butterfly because he could fly, but he wasn't buying it. This book upset him so much we ended up hiding it for awhile until we were able to get a real caterpillar and watch it change and he eventually accepted the fact. Still, I do believe this was an unusual reaction and I can't see many children being traumatised by this book. Overall, I feel this is a wonderful book which can be enjoyed by children with a wide range of ages. I would recommend this for infants up through early primary school. It is a wonderful book just for bedtime stories - but it also has very broad educational purposes. My sons both give this 5 stars and so do I. Because this book is highly praised in both home education circles, and by traditional teachers, I thought I would add some uses for this in education as well. I do feel most of these would be fun activities just for parents to try at home as well. Although it is linked in with our home education - I think having a book day is great way to brighten up a rainy day. There are so many activities with the Very Hungry Caterpillar I am planning a whole Bug week but I have tried most of these a few years back as well. At the moment I am waiting for slightly better weather to order live ants and caterpillars for our insect unit study. Literacy: this is of course the most obvious. The repetition and predictability of this text make it ideal for beginning readers. As a child is learning to read he can study the text while filling in the words from memory until the words become part of the child's reading vocabulary. Many schools also make letters on cut out circles of coloured paper which the child rearranges to build the caterpillar. Another activity might be for children to make their own books of the Very Hungry (child's name). They could write different foods they would like to eat for each day of the week - which would also tie in with the next topic - days of the week. Days of the Week: Just reading the book over and over will help a child learn the days of the week - but if you wish to provide additional material on this subject - the possibilities are endless. You can make the Very Hungry Caterpillar in coloured circles again to place the days in the correct order. You can make a chart with the caterpillar and the days of the week and cut out pieces for all the foods. Or you might use pictures of foods your child eats. You could even substitute activities for foods. My sons chart had things like Monday - Karate , Tuesday - Game Night, Wednesday - Boys Brigade - the child simply pastes or draws a picture for each day. Maths: There is a current fad of combining literature with maths in a bid to make maths sound more fun. I haven't really gone too far with this, as I feel stopping in the middle of a story to do maths problems could just makes literature seem less exciting. However, counting is a natural activity within this story and I do feel it useful for this purpose. Counting the items individually will teach a child to count up to 10. If the child is interested you might try counting all of the items together to see how many types of food the caterpillar ate in total ( 26 if you count the leaf). You can also teach concepts like more and less. Which food did the Caterpillar eat most of? Which did he eat the least of? You can even work out simple subtractions problems if you wish such as the difference between the number of oranges and apples. Another simple idea is to cut out different shapes and see if you can make caterpillars from circles, squares, triangles etc... Science: This book does also teach some science. Key Stage 1 students are expected to learn about growth and change, but in reality, I feel this is something children can grasp much earlier. This book shows the life-cycle of the caterpillar and can easily be combined with other books to see how different organisms change over time. If possible, combining this with things like insect lore kits with caterpillars would give a child a chance to witness metamorphosis first hand. In addition to metamorphosis we combined this with a unit study on insects.Is a caterpillar an insect? How do we know? What about a spider? Older children might study how the environment is affecting caterpillars. If you are old like me, you might remember seeing caterpillars creeping across the pavement - and everywhere. Now seeing one in the wild is rare. We have searched for years and found wild caterpillars on 2 occasions, + the one caterpillar my neighbour gave us after rescuing it from her cat. Realising how rare they are - i will leave the wild ones alone but the larvae from insect lore kits can be turned loose upon reaching maturity. I once offered the children in the estate a fiver if one could find a caterpillar - they searched for days but with no luck. Why are caterpillars disappearing? Could this affect other insects (bees). Can we do anything to help? Perhaps planting a butterfly garden might be a good project - or finding ways to reduce insect pests without pesticides. Health: We will be buying each fruit for our bug week and eat them in order. This can help encourage children to try new and healthier foods - although mine do like fruit anyway. But we can also discuss how the caterpillar felt when he ate the right amounts of healthy foods and he he felt after eating too much junk food. But that said we'll have a junk food day at the end as well - we'll just try to keep it in moderation. Arts and Crafts. I'll have to limit this section or I will end up with a book rather than a review. - but the possibilities are endless. The simple art work with large brush stroke is easily copied and children can easily make their own paintings of the Very Hungry Caterpillar. We used a cheap sponge cut in the shape of a circle and dipped in paint. The child can make a row of circles for the body and head, and then paint in legs, eyes and antenna. This is a very simple project even a young child can make. the same principle works with circle cookie cutters, mashing the dough down where two circles meet. I recommend using very small circles as the larger one break part easily when the children lift the caterpillars. Small pom pom balls also make lovely caterpillars especially if you get some google eyes and a bit of pipe cleaner for antenna. We have made caterpillars from the composite egg cartons as well. I imagine everyone has already tried drawing half a butterfly on paper and having the child paint it, then folding the sides together - but you can make lovely butterflies by drawing the body and having the child dip their hands in paint for the wings as well. Butterflies also come out nicely with the old scratch board techniques. You lightly colour a whole paper in brightly coloured crayon. Then pressing very hard cover it all up with a dark crayon. Finally, place a butterfly stencil over the top and have the child scape the top layer away to reveal a rainbow colored butterfly. The absolute most stunning butterflies are made by taking dark card or heavy paper and carefully cutting out the shape of the butterfly. This needs to be done by an adult only - using a razor blade or hobby knife. You then cut out large panels for the colour on the butterflies wings, and a separate bit of card to make the body. The child then pastes coloured tissue paper over the cut away parts and pastes on the body. If you hang this in a window it will catch the light nicely. One craft we have not tried yet is sock puppets, but I think it will be easy ( famous last words) I am going to buy a green pair of socks and a red pair, lop of the toes and sew red toes ( heads) onto the green body part - add some google eyes and felt legs and we can have our own puppet shows. Cake: Simply use a large frosted rectangular cake as a base. Line up a row of cupcakes on top. Use coloured ready to roll icing to cover these, then squash them together. Use two lollies for antenna, rolled up strips of icing for legs, and cut out icing eyes and nose. A few gooey fruit shapes sweets finishes the cake off. Read the complete review |
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Spot Goes to School - Eric Hill
by emmad5689 My youngest daughter really loves books and we always seem to be inheriting them from friends of mine with older children, this was one of the books we have acquired rather than bought. The front cover of the book shows Spot the dog covered in paints with an easel in front of him and him making paw prints on the paper in red, ... green and blue. The title of the book is written in bold black writing across the top of the cover and then the authors name which is Eric Hill is written underneath. The front cover is very inviting being in bright colours and Spot looks like a very happy dog. The book is about Spot the little yellow dog who I remember being in books when I was younger so this character has been around for many years. The book begins with Spots Mam seeing him off to school for the first time and Miss Bear the teacher meeting him, Spots school day begins with a sing sing around the piano then him playing in the wendy house and playing with some alphabet blocks. Spots day at school is very full and he takes part in show and tell, plays in the playground, has storytime and reads a book before the story ends with all the Mams and Dads coming to pick the children up. The pictures in the book are very brightly coloured and they are all big bold pictures with not a lot of details, the backgrounds of each picture are white making the pictures simple to follow for young children which I like. On every page there is a flap for your child to discover something, on a couple of the pages it is Spot hiding under the flap but there are other items underneath such as a box of paints or a question or saying from Spot. The story is very simple and has very few word per page yet has a lot for your child to get from each page such as using it to name colours and simple objects. I think this will be a great book to concentrate on when my youngest starts school later this year. My youngest loves lifting the flaps in the book to see what is underneath and generally lifts the flap as soon as I turn the page as she is so impatient even though she knows what is hiding on every page now as we have read it so much. I think the Spot books are lovely, they cover simple topics that your child will go through such as starting school, going on holiday and going to a farm to name a few. My daughters really enjoy the Spot books and they have been around a couple of decades now so you know they are good to have lasted that long. The only issue with them is the flaps are pretty easy to rip off if your child is heavy handed so that may be something to watch out for. Read the complete review |
Puffin Books Junior Book |
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1 review Genre: Junior Books / Author: Kathryn Cave / Edition: New Ed / Paperback / 32 Pages / Book is published 1995-05-25 by Puffin |
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Genre: Junior Books / Author: Timothy Knapman / Paperback / 32 Pages / Book is published 2008-08-07 by Puffin |
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2 reviews Genre: Junior Books / Author: Ian Whybrow / Hardcover / 32 Pages / Book is published 2005-09-01 by Puffin |
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5 reviews Genre: Junior Books / Author: Ian Whybrow / Paperback / 32 Pages / Book is published 2007-07-05 by Puffin |
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2 reviews Genre: Junior Books / Author: Ian Whybrow / Audio CD / 32 Pages / Book is published 2007-09-27 by Puffin |
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2 reviews Genre: Junior Books / Author: Leon Garfield, Kenny McKendry / Paperback / 288 Pages / Book is published 2004-11-25 by Puffin Classics - Story of Smith, a pickpocket whose profession leads him into unexpected danger. |
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4 reviews Genre: Junior Books / Author: Jay Asher / Paperback / 304 Pages / Book is published 2009-08-06 by Puffin |
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1 review Genre: Junior Books / Author: Anna Perera / Paperback / Reading Level: Young Adult / 352 Pages / Book is published 2009-02-05 by Puffin |
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1 review Genre: Junior Books / Author: Graeme Base / Paperback / 32 Pages / Book is published 2007-11-01 by Puffin |
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Genre: Junior Books / Author: Jacqueline Wilson / Edition: New Ed / Paperback / 112 Pages / Book is published 2000-09-28 by Puffin |
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