The Complete Book of Farmyard Tales by Heather Amery
This is a collection of 20 different stories about life on Apple Tree farm from Usborne Books. Each tale is about the animals or adventures of the Boot family- Mrs. Boot, the farmer, and her two children Poppy and Sam. The stories are short and entertaining. Stephen Cartwright's charming illustrations hide a duck on each page and Jonathan had lots of fun trying to find the duck. Jonathan has really enjoyed these-- he remembered the stories long after we read them and even acted some of them out with his farm animals, such as having his little pig get stuck in a fence. Very cute and lots of value-- the stories have simple text at the top and more complex sentences at the bottom of each page. These will make great early readers as well.
Poke-A-Dot! Old MacDonald's Farm
Oh how Jonathan just loves this book. I requested it from our library after seeing it recommended in the Timberdoodle catalog. This is a book that is about the traditional folk song Old MacDonald's Farm. It's a counting book, counting down from ten cows to one rooster. The clever and kid-appealing part of the book is their "Pop-a-tronic" technology-- each page has clear, clickable buttons for children to push, one for each number. It helps to reinforce counting and teach one-to-one number correspondence. Jonathan loved popping the buttons and wanted to read this book over, and over, and over again. Sometimes he was so excited about the buttons that he'd forget to count. This was a huge hit!
Mrs. Wishy-Washy's Farm by Joy Cowley
Mrs. Wishy-Washy is a farm woman who just loves to have everything clean-- including her animals! She scrubs the animals down regularly and one day cow, pig, and duck decide they've had enough. They run away to the big city and have adventures until they decide maybe the farm is the best place to live after all. The rhyming verse is very catchy and easy to read-aloud. The illustrations are equally engaging. Jonathan had fun listening to this read-aloud and saying "wishy-washy". As a fun read along activity, we brought his Little People farm animals into the tub one night and "wishy-washeyed" them until they were squeaky clean!
The Year at Maple Hill Farm by Alice and Martin Provensen
This was a bit of a longer read-aloud that we read over breakfast one morning. It's about farm animals and what happens of the course of a year on a farm. As the months and seasons change, the animals respond accordingly. In the winter, the animals stay close to the farm. In the Spring, the baby animals are born. In the summer, the bugs come out and the weather gets hot and the fall brings pumpkins and frost. It's a beautiful book that helped us talk about the changing seasons and life on a farm. Some aspects of the farm Jonathan could relate to, as my husband's parents live on a horse farm. I think this will be a book we come back to as we learn about seasons and the passing of time.
Stay tuned tomorrow to see our farm activities. :)
Oh how Jonathan just loves this book. I requested it from our library after seeing it recommended in the Timberdoodle catalog. This is a book that is about the traditional folk song Old MacDonald's Farm. It's a counting book, counting down from ten cows to one rooster. The clever and kid-appealing part of the book is their "Pop-a-tronic" technology-- each page has clear, clickable buttons for children to push, one for each number. It helps to reinforce counting and teach one-to-one number correspondence. Jonathan loved popping the buttons and wanted to read this book over, and over, and over again. Sometimes he was so excited about the buttons that he'd forget to count. This was a huge hit!
Mrs. Wishy-Washy is a farm woman who just loves to have everything clean-- including her animals! She scrubs the animals down regularly and one day cow, pig, and duck decide they've had enough. They run away to the big city and have adventures until they decide maybe the farm is the best place to live after all. The rhyming verse is very catchy and easy to read-aloud. The illustrations are equally engaging. Jonathan had fun listening to this read-aloud and saying "wishy-washy". As a fun read along activity, we brought his Little People farm animals into the tub one night and "wishy-washeyed" them until they were squeaky clean!
This was a bit of a longer read-aloud that we read over breakfast one morning. It's about farm animals and what happens of the course of a year on a farm. As the months and seasons change, the animals respond accordingly. In the winter, the animals stay close to the farm. In the Spring, the baby animals are born. In the summer, the bugs come out and the weather gets hot and the fall brings pumpkins and frost. It's a beautiful book that helped us talk about the changing seasons and life on a farm. Some aspects of the farm Jonathan could relate to, as my husband's parents live on a horse farm. I think this will be a book we come back to as we learn about seasons and the passing of time.
Stay tuned tomorrow to see our farm activities. :)
I see you posted about Mrs. Wishy Washy... i love that book and so does my class. Check out http://www.makinglearningfun.com
ReplyDeletethey have a whole section of free downloadable Mrs. Wishy Washy activities!