Little Mouse's Big Book of Fears

Title: Little Mouse's Big Book of Fears

Author: Emily Gravett

Award: Kate Greenaway Medal (for distinguished illustrations in children's books)

"Everyone is afraid of something." But if we can face our fears, we can defeat it. A great book to share with children or adults to look at the different fears and phobias ( you actually get to know the scientific name of the fears) and realized that they are really irrational. 

This is one of my latest addition to my collection. This is one of the most interactive books I've seen complete with holes in the pages, flaps, a fold up map, spaces to do your own writing and doodling and a certificate right at the end to be presented to the worthy one who has overcome his/her fear.

I'm in the process of collecting more of her books :)

Stellaluna

Title: Stellaluna

Author: Janell Cannon

Awards: ABBY Winner

Look inside the book at Amazon here.

"Stellaluna" must be one of the first few children's books that I've invested in (SGD$30 was a lot to spend on a book during the early days of of NIE). I discovered it in Borders. And when I saw the book, I knew I must have it. My friends and I were looking for a good story book to share as part of our project for a KWL strategy for a lesson demonstration.  We used it for a tuning in activity for the children to be more interested about bats (since Stellaluna was just so adorable) before an information text about bats is presented. I was in charge of reading the story.  Anyway, after the entire presentation, our tutor said, "Excellent!" and we got an A for that. And I can't remember how many times after that I've used "Stellaluna" in class for other activities. It had remained at the top on my favourite list for a long time. Well, I have the Stellaluna beanie and Stellaluna is part of the wall mural in my school's library :P

The story is about Stellaluna, a baby bat who 'lost' her mother after an owl attacked them. She eventually landed up in a bird nest where three baby birds live. Stellaluna eventually gave up her 'bat's habits' and learned to be like a bird to be accepted, which was really comical. In the end, she found her bat family again where she found it was alright for her to behave like a bat once again. 

I love the underlying message that everyone of us is unique. We do not have to change ourselves or others to suit us. We just have to accept one another as we are. 

The illustrations are really beautiful. See!

Wild About Books

Decided to share "Wild About Books"written by Judy Sierra and illustrated by Marc Brown first since this is the title of my blog :)

This is a lovely story about how the different animals at the zoo became wild about books when Molly the librarian drove her mobile library to the zoo.

Love the rhyme and pictures.

Extracts from the book:
"In a flash, every beast in the zoo was stampeding
To learn all about this new something called reading."
"Forsaking their niches, their nests and their nooks,
They went wild, simply wild, about wonderful books,
Choosing thin books and fat books and Cat in the Hat books
And new books and true books and heaps of how-to books."

Bought this book so that I could share it during a school assembly programme to excite the children about Molly the Mobile Library that was visiting the school. I've managed to arrange with NLB to have the mobile library visit the school.

Look inside the book on Amazon here.

Check out this toddler reading the book on you-tube. So get your child to be wild about books as early as possible.

Related Lesson Plans available on-line:
Scholastic Lesson Plan
Monarch

Let's Get Wild About Books

Welcome to my new blog! :) Decided to start this blog share some of my favourite children's books. I believe that the best gift we can give to a child is the love for books. So thought this is going to be a great place for me to share with anyone who would love to share a good book with a child.

I can't remember how I really got into reading. I don't remember my parents reading to me when I was a child or bringing me to the library. It must have started in school.  I remembered when I was in Primary 2,  my form teacher gave me a storybook as a reward for doing well in class.  It was a bible story, can't really remember which one it was.  In Primary 3, I remembered reading Enid Blyton, being carried to the magical lands on the Magic Faraway Tree.

Then in Primary 5, my English teacher, Miss Hwee Wei Ling, read to our class "The Twits" by Roald Dahl. On a Saturday, I found out about a Puffin Book Sale in Tanjong Pagar and took the new SMRT train From Yishun on my own trying to find the sale so that I can get my hands on the book. Unfortunately, to my disappointment, I had lost my way. See! From young, I'm been travelling around Singapore in search of my books! I visited 2nd-hand book stores, took the bus to the Ang Mo Kio National Library, visit the Popular bookstore at Tao Payoh, usually on my own.

I continued to read (on and off) all through adulthood. About 10 years ago, when I went for teacher training at NIE, I was brought back to the magical world of children's books. And I started collecting them. When I had my teaching practicum, I had a story to share for lessons everyday. And over the years, I've build up a collection of children's books that filled up my class library. These are books that I would love to share with my own children in the future. I became the school's library coordinator which meant that I was able to 'indulge' in my favourite past-time- shopping for children's books.

Sometimes I questioned myself why I spend so much on children's books as I have no children of my own to read these stories to. But I figured that the children in my class will really benefit from the collection in my class. And to further justify my spending, I told myself if people can spend thousands on  a handbag, I can spend on my books. Others shop for clothes, shoes, cosmetics and handbags, I shop for books.

Then when I stopped teaching, I wondered what is to become of all these books. I've donated some but decided to keep the rest. I love them too much to give them all away. And I still hope to share these books with my children in the future. In the meantime, they will help to entertain the children who visit our home.

I would like to use this blog to keep my interest in children's books alive and as a venue to share some of the interesting children's books that I've collected or came across over the years. Hope that it will be useful to someone out there :)

Remember that the best gift we can give to a child is the love for books! So let us all just get wild about books!