Nutritious flowers (Usborne Farmyard Tales: The Hungry Donkey - Heather Amery)

Member Name: zerub

Product:	Usborne Farmyard Tales: The Hungry Donkey - Heather Amery
Date:	05/04/09 (120 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Donkeys eating hats

Disadvantages: No tractors

This is one of the stories in the Usborne Farmyard Tales series. If your child likes it, there are dozens more! The first part of this review is about the series, and the second part about the particular book.

--- The series ---
The stories are about two children, their mum who is the farmer, and their dog, and what they get up to on the farm. The stories are short, and exciting (if you are three).

--- Learning to read ---
The clever thing about these stories is that they are written on two levels. At the top of each page is a short sentence, and at the bottom of the page is a couple of longer sentences. You can read the book by reading the top of each page, or the bottom, or both. If you read both there will be a little bit of overlap.

For example, the top of the page says "There is a donkey on the farm."
And the bottom of the page says "The donkey is called Ears. She lives in a field with lots of grass but she is always hungry."

The point is that when your child starts to read, they can read the top of the page fairly easily and so have the pleasure of reading a much-loved story by themselves. Although it is entirely possible that you will have read the story so many times by then that they'll know the words by heart.

--- The pictures ---
The illustrations are quite detailed, so there is a lot to look at. My son pretty much knows the stories so he can sit and examine the pictures, and does so for quite long periods of time.

On each pages there is a small duck hiding somewhere - my children take great delight in hunting for and spotting the duck on each page.

--- The format ---
The book has 16 pages which is a good length for a 2-4 year-old's attention span. You can get them in several formats. I like the small ones - 14cm square books. They are small and light, which makes them very easy for a little child to hold and carry around. Most children's picture books are very big (so you can get a lot of good pictures in!) but these are child-sized. They're good for taking on holiday too - plenty of stories but not too much suitcase room.

--- The price ---
It costs £3.99, although I would recommend buying a few in a set and getting them cheaper that way.

--- The Hungry Donkey ---
In this story we are introduced to a donkey called Ears, who is always hungry - not because she isn't fed, but because she just is. Lots of small children can identify with that!

There is lots of excitement as today is the day of the village show. The children spend lots of time making Ears look good and attaching her cart to pull. This is all very lovely - how wonderful to have a pet donkey to brush and comb, and how marvellous to be going to a fair in a cart pulled by your own donkey!

Then comes a moment of suspense when the children leave the donkey alone. It is obvious to quite small children that the donkey is going to get into mischief here.

Ears escapes and starts to eat the fruit and flowers off a lady's highly-decorated hat! This is hilarious when you are three, trust me. There is a beautiful drawing of the Boot family and the lady chasing the donkey across the field.

The lady is mollified by being allowed to drive the donkey into the ring for the Best Donkey competition. I don't think I'd want to, if I'd just had my hat eaten, but still.

Of course, Ears wins the competition - and the lady is given a new hat too. So Ears gets to keep the old one. Alls well that ends well, naturally.

Summary: A funny little story