Pulling together (And Everyone Shouted, "Pull!" - Claire Llewellyn)

Member Name: tb4ms

Product:	And Everyone Shouted, "Pull!" - Claire Llewellyn
Date:	24/02/09 (131 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Introduces children to the concept of forces in a simple way

Disadvantages: The cost.

- The book -

This book is a good way of looking at forces and motion in a very simplistic way for children up to approx 7 years old.

It is set on a farm where the animals are counting the items ready for market day. The animals have a dilemma, 'How can they take the goods to market?'

They come up with lots of suggestions, e.g. the dog says he can pull the sack the donkey says she can carry the milk churn on her back etc.

They decide that the cart can carry the things as wheels roll along the ground nice and smoothly but since wheels can't move by themselves they realise that they have to pull the cart to get the wheels to turn.

After initial heaves, the cart begins to move along steadily until they reach a hill and they discuss how they have to pull harder when they are going uphill whereas the opposite happens when they begin going downhill.

When it begins to rain the ground turns soft and muddy and once again they have to pull harder as the wheels get stuck. Finally they reach the market!

The last double page has a reference / information section 'All about forces' setting out lots of facts, e.g.
~ A force can be a push or a pull.
~ It takes a force to make things change direction.
~ Moving uphill takes a bigger force than moving downhill.
~ It takes a force to make things stop.

On this page there is also a small section of useful words and their definitions, for example:
~ Pull is to tug something.
~ Push is to move something forward in front of you.

- Style, Format and Illustrations -

This is made up of short narratives, usually two short sentences on each double page. The rest of the text is made up from speech bubbles from the animals, with the younger and smaller animals asking the questions and usually the older donkey giving short explanations.

There are 13 double pages in the book which are brightly illustrated. The animals are very realistic and the drawings work very well alongside the text as they show the animals either pushing or pulling and even demonstrate how it's harder work pulling the cart uphill.

- Price -

ISBN 0-750-238003-8 costs £6.99 in paperback but amazon are selling it for £5.24.

- Overall -

This is a very good way of introducing young children to the difficult concept of forces. I have used this as an introduction to the topic with Key Stage 1 children (5-7 year olds) and we have then gone on to undertake investigations.
The children look upon this as a fiction book due to the animals telling the story and discussing things and they do learn from it.
Definitely worth taking a trip to the library and looking at this series of books if your little ones are interested in early Science.

'Little Bees' series of non-fiction books are aimed at 'encouraging children to question the world around them'.

~ What's that noise? A first look at sound and hearing.
~ Switch on, switch off. A first look at electricity.
~ It's a material world. A first look at materials.
~ From little acorns. A first look at the life cycle of a tree.
~ A rainbow of colours. A first look at colour.
~ From sunrise to sunset. A first look at light.

Summary: A good book but worth vorrowing it from the library rather than the £6.99 RRP