Behind the makeup: Tre's Bookshelf: September 26, 2013

Welcome to Tre’s Bookshelf! Let’s get started!

He wanted to get on the "puter" during our last library visit

As a refresher here are the books we read these last two weeks:

If You Give A Cat A Cupcake-Laura Numeroff

Bear and Bunny Grow Tomatoes-Bruce Koscielniak

Before I go to sleep- Ronne Randall

Time For School Mouse-Laura Numeroff

Just In Case You Ever Wonder- Max Lucado

If You Give A Cat A Cupcake-Laura Numeroff

What makes this book appropriate?
First I must say that I love all of the books written by Laura Numeroff. They are humorous even for adults. This book is appropriate because it’s constantly building. It displays if : then scenarios for children in a way that’s fun while displaying lots of discussion points.

What was mommy’s favorite part of the book?
Did I mention I love all of Numeroff’s books? I DO! How often do we as mom’s find ourselves in these, if you… then, situations? If we buy that shirt then we will have to find a skirt to go with it only to realize we don’t have the shoes we thought we had when we bought the shirt so THEN we have to buy some shoes. If we get the shoes we have to accessories and more than likely if we get accessories we better have somewhere special to wear all of this to. Lol! I rarely shop for myself but when I do I’m always living out this scenario! It’s a relatable book for any age and we all know if we give our kids a cupcake for breakfast they will probably want a cupcake for the rest of the day.

What did Tre love about the book?

This was the ONLY book he wanted to read over and over and I’m SURE it is because it talked about cupcakes. There is a part in the story where the cat tries to carry some of the stuff he found at the beach (because once he received his cupcake he became dirty, needed a bath, the bath reminded him of the beach and voila). The cat realizes the stuff he’s trying to carry is too heavy (which is Tre’s favorite phrase these days) and he decides he needs to go to the gym. While at the gym he takes a karate class and once I made some karate sound effects and some non-threatening karate moves (I never took karate so imagine how this played out) that was the most exciting page for him. He loved making the noises; he had never seen a karate move or even knew the word karate, so it was a fun, teachable moment for us.

Bear and Bunny Grow Tomatoes-Bruce Koscielniak

What makes this book appropriate?
This book is not a book for toddlers in that it has more words than what you would find in your board books. Therefore, I did a lot of sentence shortening and free styling to make it interesting. We know that repetition is usually the theme of most books for young children and that’s what I did with this book. Bear and Bunny decide to grow tomatoes but Bear works hard at his garden while Bunny DOES NOT. However, at the end of the book when Bear finds his garden is overflowing with tomatoes and Bunny doesn’t have ANY tomatoes, Bear decides to share with Bunny and I felt that was a great lesson to teach our children.

What was mommy’s favorite part of the book?
My favorite part of the book was pointing out all of the things Bunny was doing instead of tending his garden. Bunny makes lemonade, has a pool party, takes a nap, reads a book and in all honesty, I don’t have a green thumb, I could see a lot of myself in Bunny.

What did Tre love about the book?
Tre enjoyed counting the tomatoes that Bear grew as well as counting the bunnies that Bunny had over for the pool party! When I asked him what Bear did with his tomatoes at the end of the book he said very loudly, He SHARED with Bunny!

Before I go to sleep- Ronne Randall

What makes this book appropriate?
I always try to find at least one book that has a bed time routine. Sometimes bedtime at our house can be a challenge but having story time as a part of our nightly routine helps the transition. In addition to reading a book that shows other kids going to bed it resonates with my son that he should do the same. This book is appropriate because it shows a little boy saying Good Night (Night-Night) to his parents, his toys, his pets as well as the moon and the stars.

What was mommy’s favorite part of the book?
I loved the size and the graphics of this book. It was as if each page had a cloudy effect which made me think about going to sleep. I also liked that it’s an engaging book. There are many different items that he could identify with in the book which encouraged discussions between us and that’s something I love.

What did Tre love about the book?
There is a part in the book when the little boy “travels” in a red boat through the air with his cat and stuffed animal saying good night to his grandparents’ house as well as the moon and stars and he enjoyed talking about the red boat and of course the moon at the end!

Time For School Mouse-Laura Numeroff

What makes this book appropriate?
This is another Numeroff book, with those graphics that we love, but this book talks about responsibility. It is time for mouse to go to school but he can’t find his homework so the book goes through all the things he DOES find until he finds his homework. I would say this book would be more appropriate for a 3 or 4 year old who might understand responsibility better than my busy two year old who was only interested in one page.

What was mommy’s favorite part of the book?
Although it wasn’t attention grabbing for my little one I loved the message of this book. It is important that we teach our children to keep up with their things, to treat their things nicely, and to be responsible with their work especially their school work. It is a great lesson that all children can benefit from but this book wasn’t the type of delivery that worked for my kiddo.

What did Tre love about the book?
There is a page in the book where the mouse finds all types of toys and shapes and knick knacks and he would go through and name each one or ask me what they were if he didn’t know.

Just In Case You Ever Wonder- Max Lucado

What makes this book appropriate?
Max Lucado writes inspirational books for children and this book shares the love of God and what you love about your children with them.

What was mommy’s favorite part of the book?
I picked this book up because Heather Lindsey posted a picture of her reading You are Special by Max Lucado to her 6 month old son on instagram before we returned our last set of books. I made a mental note to incorporate one of his books in this library visit. I love that this book talks about the goodness of God loving us, caring for us, creating us and that we as parents feel the same way! Although it’s a board book it’s pretty lengthy and very wordy so I would spend a lot of time reading it out loud while he ran and played in his room just so he could hear me reading.

What did Tre love about the book?
Bad news: Tre did not read this book once. When given a choice he would pick all of the other books but this one. But just because your child isn’t interested in a book doesn’t mean you never read it! Read it out loud anyway because your voice is attractive to your children, your words encourage language, and seeing you read is a great example for your children to read as well! :)

Here are my “rules” for reading with my toddler:

1. Make it exciting! I give voices to each character. I emphasize the exclamation points. I express each emotion with facial expressions included and he LOVES it. If you ever hear me read a book to children it will probably be entertaining but I bet YOU won’t want to miss what happens next. ;)

2. Make it plain! Sometimes I venture outside of the board book section and if you have a toddler you know you have a small window to WOW them because their attention will redirect *snaps fingers* like that. So if I get a book with LOTS of words on the pages (ex: The Bernstein bear collection) but the pictures are descriptive enough that they can visually understand what’s going on I FREESTYLE! I will create a story based on the pictures in such a way that he can understand.

3. Make it interactive! I don’t know about you but there is no fun in having someone read AT you. Through our reading I am constantly asking him questions about items in the background, what characters are wearing, colors on the pages, who the characters are (i.e. mommy, daddy, etc), and if there are letters that stand out I will even ask him about those.

4. Make them read to YOU! No matter what age or how extensive the language children possess the ability to point to something familiar and associate a word they’ve learned, even if it’s just one word, and tell you about it. When Scott was younger I would still ask him read the book to mommy and the story might consist of 4 words based on the items he could identify but I would fill in the gaps by explaining the rest. An example would be if he/she sees a bottle on the page and all they can say is “bottle” you might fill in the gaps by saying, “Yes that is a bottle! It looks like the baby is drinking from the bottle while her mommy reads her a bedtime story.” In that time you have validated their ability to identify items, you have encouraged them to read, and you have expanded on their language by filling in the gaps.

What books did you read to your little ones this week?

Happy Reading!

All My Love,

Caneeka

My best girl turned 30 on the 17th of September and here is my tribute to our friendship!

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