Spot's Gone All Noisy (Spot's Birthday - Eric Hill)

Member Name: belfin

Product:	Spot's Birthday - Eric Hill
Date:	06/04/07 (129 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: This lovable puppy is a favourite with most children

Disadvantages: Keep it hidden in the mornings in case your little one decides to waken you up with it.

***Background***

Eric Hill has written a wide variety of stories about the popular character Spot and these come in many forms, such as board books and flap books. This one however, takes it to another level as a sound book.

***The Story***

The story starts by telling us that it’s Spot’s birthday and that his mother Sally is busy making a cake. There is then a picture of a doorbell and Spot runs down the stairs to answer the door.

As we go through the book there are pictures of Spot, a trumpet, a single musical note, a cup with a straw, a trampoline and one of three musical notes. Each one is the queue to press the corresponding button at the side of the book to hear what noise it makes.

The story tells how all Spot’s friends arrive for his party. Spot opens all his presents and then they play musical chairs before they have some tea. Spot then makes a wish and blows out his candles before his friends sing Happy Birthday.

After some drinks they decide to play musical statues and pass the parcel. Spot wins pass the parcel and the prize is out in the garden. When they go out Spot is surprised to see a big trampoline and they all take turns in jumping on it.

***The Illustrations***

Simple and colourful are the only words to really sum up the description of the pictures in this storybook. The familiar characters are also recognisable from the short stories that can also be seen on television and on many videos and DVDs.

***My Thoughts***

I’m not personally aware of any young child that doesn’t like Spot and his friends. Most of the Spot books that we have had in the past have been lift the flap books and it’s nice to get something a little bit different.

The sound of Spot’s giggle is delightful for my son and he seems to love pressing that button the most. I have to say that my older daughter disagrees with this, especially as he likes to look at books when he first wakens up early, and this has been known to waken her up long before she normally surfaces for school.

With this being in the board book format, it’s really sturdy and the plastic section at the left of the book seems to be really securely fixed to the back of the book. Some sound books we have had in the past were useless after the batteries ran out but this book has a rectangular cut out on the back of the book where you can open up the battery bit with a small Philips screwdriver and replace the three button batteries. This used to be quite expensive but there are quite a lot of the pound shops that sell big cards of about 25 – 50 various sized button batteries for only £1 so if you are looking for replacement watch batteries etc, then try one of those first before going into a jewellers.

The story is more than you would expect for a Spot book and there are quite a few sentences of text of each page, which gives more opportunities for button pressing and noise making along the way.

I’m a great believer in making reading interesting for young children and they often get bored by long stories with nothing but a few pictures to look at. I have a large variety of flap or touch and feel books and they have always been of great interest to my son when we visit the local library, where he seems drawn to them. This one really has everything you could hope for in a book for a toddler and the lovable character is always a favourite.


***Other Spot Sound Books***

Spot’s Noisy Walk
Spot’s Big Nursery Song Book
Spot’s Busy Week
Spot’s Rainy Day
Spot’s Day Out


***Price & Availability***

This book is available for the publishing price of £5.99 but can be found at Tesco for only £4.49.

ISBN No. 0723257779

Summary: Great story and fun sounds.