Boards Books

This book is adorable. It is great for children who speak Spanish or English!

This is a great book for the beginner child. very short and easy read. i highly recommend

Normally I would say that my daughter is a little old for this type of book. At 5 she is a bit beyond little board books without many words. But for laying a foundation for Spanish, this book is just what both she & I need. The simple sentences allow us to see what exactly each word means, as well as get an intuitive grasp on the grammer, and the pronunciation guide in the back is VERY helpfull.

I know that we will quickly move beyond this book, but for now I view it as essential for our grasping Spanish. In fact, I plan on buying the other books in this series.

This is another book that I enjoyed by this author. My children have asked me to continue to purchase this books and they read them all the time. I see the joy and excitement on their faces as they say different words in Spanish and actually know the meaning. I feel that it is important for the and myself to learn a second language, and books like these have been able to serve as a base for my entire family. It's easy to read and grasp, and a good reference to look at when necessary. Keep up the great work Gladys and I'll keep reading your books. Learning is a continuous process and now it's become really fun!

I am bilingual and am raising my son bilingual, too. This is an excellent book and series with adorable pictures, and each page has both english and spanish on it. The back includes pronunciation guides for all the vocabulary (both for english and spanish) which is helpful for my husband, a non-native speaker. It's very hard to find quality bilingual books- I've looked around a lot and loved these so much I have even given them as gifts to friends who want to introduce their kids (and themselves) to the language.

This one is by far the best out of this series. I don't know who enjoys these books the most, my 10-month old son or my husband who is learning Spanish. The beautiful graphics in all the books in this series keep them both engaged. After he outgrows these books, we are looking forward to utilizing them as a resource for art projects. This particular book contains no errors per se, but keep in mind that the Spanish language is very rich, and there are different words (used in Spain, Mexico, the Caribbean, Central and South America) that mean the same thing.

Whether you're introducing Spanish to your child, or wanting a nice review, this book is GREAT because of the bright, simple pictures, its sturdiness, and its perfect size for younger children through upper elementary.

I pull out this book when I need another way to drill numbers in my Spanish classes. It goes great with the numbers lesson in the workbook Flip Flop Spanish!

A enjoy looking at this book just as much as my children do. I am a mother of 4 and a preschool teacher. The colors in this book are simple and bold. It is a great resource for teaching Spanish/English and numbers in the classroom. I like the fact that the Spanish words are not the simplest choices. It challenges the Spanish learner in me. I use this book with pre-schoolers mainly 2 year olds. It is easily adaptable to the older classroom learning Spanish.

MY NUMBERS/MIS NUMEROS is a simple, fun book. There are two pages for the numbers one through ten. The first page shows the number, with the name of the number in English and Spanish. On the facing page is a picture, with as many instances of that object as go with the number.

The illustrations in MY NUMBERS/MIS NUMEROS are spectacular. They look as if they were made using cutouts of construction paper, and combine overall simplicity with some fascinating detail. For example, for the number one the illustration is of a salamander with little round ends to his toes. My son puts his finger out and traces over the shapes with fascination. Each of the ten illustrations is excellent.

My 10-month old son loves MY NUMBERS/MIS NUMEROS. It is one that he will pull out of the book basket and look at at on his own. A good friend of mine, an artists and former teacher, loves it. Her 2 year old son also enjoyed reading this book, enough that we read it over and over when I recently babysat him. I am also enjoying MY NUMBERS/MIS NUMEROS as a way to brush up on a bit of my Spanish.

The vocabulary: 1 salamander, 2 leaves, 3 strawberries, 4 hearts, 5 carrots, 6 snakes, 7 stars, 8 bumblebees, 9 ladybugs, and 10 butterflies.

I have been using this entire series with my son since he was born, and he is now 14 months. He loves the pictures and turning the pages. The books use the format of one word per page and it gives both the English and Spanish form of the word. This is a great series for early language acquisition.

the gift recipient of this book was very happy with it and reads a lot of Virginia Woolf.

I have read this book many times over the past 25 years at different stages in my life and I have loved it every time. Virginia Woolf is my favorite author (this and To The Lighthouse are her best works, in my opinion), and have given the book to my daughter, Katharine, for Christmas. (Guess who she's named after?) This book is an "easy" read, unlike many of Virginia Woolf's other novels, and follows a conventional style. However, there is nothing conventional about her writing; I have yet to come across another novelist with her ability to touch on everyday life with such subtlety and nuance. The characters in this book are very likeable - it's as if I have known them in my own life. Love this book!

For those of you who have disdain for vanity publishers, as some call the self-published authors, be advised that much of Virginia Woolf's work was self-published through the Hogarth Press. She has been hailed as one of the greatest novelists of the twentieth century and one of the foremost Modernists, though she disdained some artists in this category. Woolf is considered one of the greatest innovators in the English language. In her works she experimented with stream-of-consciousness, the underlying psychological as well as emotional motives of characters, and the various possibilities of fractured narrative and chronology. Her literary achievements and creativity are influential even today. Historic London is the setting of Night and Day. The novel and its characters center around one place in particular the Hilbery home, an eighteenth-century house built on the Thames riverfront in Chelsea, London, a house that doubles as the literary shrine for a great Victorian poet, Richard Alardyce. The emotionally strained and serious Katharine Hilbery gives an American visitor a tour of her poet grandfather's study in the presence of her former fiance. This room is both a "religious temple" devoted to Richard Alardyce and a commercial showroom for which she is the "show-woman" of remains not for sale. Katharine, preoccupied by the interruption of feelings into her life, guides the American through the collection inattentively, thus rendering the effusive American's enthusiasm absurd. This bewildered pilgrim and the home's other specimens--Katharine Hilbery's father, an influential editor of a literary journal; her mother, an energetic though disarranged steward of her poet-father's memory; and their circle of visitors who cannot abide living writers--all point to a critique of a literary establishment and its morbid maintenance of the literary past as the only worthwhile present. Night and Day is a portrait of Virginia Woolf's and (her sister) Vanessa Bell's family home at Hyde Park Gate, ruled by Leslie Stephen, who, as an influential man of letters and steward to the Victorian literary establishment, is Mr. and Mrs. Hilbery combined. ... "He received her assurance with profound joy. Quietly and steadily there rose up behind the whole aspect of life that soft edge of fire which gave its red tint to the atmosphere and crowded the scene with shadows so deep and dark that one could fancy pushing farther into their density and still farther, exploring indefinitely." Woolf's reputation declined sharply after World War II, but her eminence was re-established with the surge of Feminist criticism in the 1970s. After a few more ideologically based altercations, not least caused by claims that Woolf was anti-semitic and a snob, it seems that a critical consensus has been reached regarding her stature as a novelist. Virginia Woolf's peculiarities as a fiction writer have tended to obscure her central strength. The intensity of Virginia Woolf's poetic vision elevates the ordinary, sometimes banal settings of most of her novels, even as they are often set in an environment of war. For example, Mrs. Dalloway (1925) centres on the efforts of Clarissa Dalloway, a middle-aged society woman, to organize a party, even as her life is paralleled with that of Septimus Warren Smith, a working-class veteran who has returned from the First World War bearing deep psychological scars. To the Lighthouse (1927) is set on two days ten years apart. The plot centers around the Ramsay family's anticipation of and reflection upon a visit to a lighthouse and the connected familial tensions. One of the primary themes of the novel is the struggle in the creative process that beset painter Lily Briscoe while she struggles to paint in the midst of the family drama. The novel is also a meditation upon the lives of a nation's inhabitants in the midst of war, and of the people left behind. The Waves (1931) presents a group of six friends whose reflections, which are closer to recitatives than to interior monologues proper, create a wave-like atmosphere that is more akin to a prose poem than to a plot-centered novel. Her last work, Between the Acts (1941) sums up and magnifies Woolf's chief preoccupations: the transformation of life through art, sexual ambivalence, and meditation on the themes of flux of time and life, presented simultaneously as corrosion and rejuvenation - all set in a highly imaginative and symbolic narrative encompassing almost all of English history. Recently, studies of Virginia Woolf have focused on feminist and lesbian themes in her work, such as in the 1997 collection of critical essays, Virginia Woolf: Lesbian Readings, edited by Eileen Barrett and Patricia Cramer. The Hours is a 2002 Academy Award winning film and Best Picture nominee about three women of different generations and times whose lives are interconnected by Virginia Woolf's novel, Mrs. Dalloway. All the action takes place within the span of one day.
Trish New, author of The Thrill of Hope and South State Street Journal.

As in the other Virginia Woolf books I have read, what strikes me first and foremost is the wonderful writing. The descriptions are phenomenal, starting with the surroundings and continuing with the character's facial expressions. Some of the passages are pure poetry and the characters are beautifully and consistently drawn out. Oddly, although we know that Katharine is beautiful, we do not get a description of her, or of any other person in the story, with the exception of William Rodney.

Woolf became a little heavy when it went into the minds of the characters who are in crises, but as one reaches the end of the book, all is forgiven.

An excellent read!

Here is an artist at work, painting the nuances of the heart, creating living people, reacting to the subtleties of mood, ambiance, the weather, and external perceptions that make up how we live and who we are. No matter what you think of these people, you have a chance to live with them and understand them, feel their conflicts, their love, and their pains. Virginia Woolf is the ballast that offsets all the one-book-wonder authors, the cynics, the nasty moderns, and those authors who have given up on anything positive in the world. Like Shakespeare, her work will live on long after so many others are forgotten. That's because she offers us art, hope, vision, and the truth about our humanity. It's all here in this book, if you choose to read it.

I feel that this book is a very well written book. It has pictures that follow the plot of the book and this helps younger children. I know that many children would relate well to this book because they do not like to see their toys locked up in a box. When I read this book it reminded me of when I was younger and I had a bear that got put in a box and I went and got it! So I feel that this is a good book to read to younger children from toddlers to third graders.

One day, Bramwell Brown remembers his friend Old Bear who was put away in the attic. Bramwell and the other stuffed animals decide to get him back.

What follows is a series of failed attempts to reach the attic until finally one succeeds and the toys are united.

I like this story because it does show the process of thinking through a problem as well as perseverance (even when Duck thinks there is no hope). As with many children's books there are a few logic problems, but overall it reads very well.

Look for the other Little Bear stories as well.

"I knew it was going to be a special day." said Bramwell Bear to himself. -Duck, Rabbit, Little Bear, and Bramwell Bear struggle to capture their long lost, and forgotten friend, Old Bear. Old Bear has been stored in the attic for a while because the children played roughly with him.

Old Bear's friends are really caring friends, especially Little Bear, my favorite character. Little Bear climbs from the airplane into the attic and recovers Old Bear. -True friendship.

I remember reading this book plenty of times 11 years ago, and always treasuring it. If you like cute books with good illustrations and a group of brave, loving stuffed animals, you should read this book!

From the first day I brought this book home, my daughter has loved it. "Old Bear" was one of the first phrases she said. This book teaches that by trying new ideas and working together, you can accomplish anything. It's a wonderful life lesson for toddlers, with captivating drawings and warm, loveable characters. I would highly recommend this book, along with any others by Jane Hissey, to all parents.

Every morning our eighteen month old daughter starts the day by exclaiming 'Old Bear!' - the cue that one of us must read it with her without further ado. If it's not left in her cot at night, she often says, 'Oh dear, Old Bear?'. In short this book really wins the toddler vote. Our toddler learnt how to wobble by reading this. She also learnt the meaning of 'sad'. Old bear is a story of lasting friendship, teamwork among stuffed toys, and a daring airborne rescue bid. Contrary to one review, the pictures are not 'sugary-sweet', Our very discerning daughter loves them, and actually, so do I. We have found that we've read the book so often that the words are imprinted in our memories - but amazingly we don't mind. All together now: 'One day the toys were sitting by the window when they remembered their friend Old Bear...'

My five year old son loved Over the Ocean in a Coral Reef so much we kept checking it out of the library. I finally purchased the book and also purchased Over in the Jungle. Both books are beautifully written but especially beautifully illustrated. I especially like the information in the back of the books about the animals depicted in the story. We have read the stories over and over none of us ever tire of reading them, nor looking at the beautiful illustrations.

Having collected all of Marianne Berkes books this is by far the best! We thought nothing could top her "Ocean" book but...this does! The wording is something the children do readily respond too! Mental pictures take over and the children become very animated in the telling of the story and take on the differnet animal sounds and postures.
This book is a winner for all who take the time to introduce children to their world far removed from the everyday life. You can see their imaginations expanding as the story unfolds! The illustrations and colors by Jeanette Canyon draw the cildren to Marianne Berkes' books, like bees to honey.

The Mom's Choice Awards® honors excellence in family-friendly media, products and services. An esteemed panel of judges includes education, media and other experts as well as parents, children, librarians, performing artists, producers, medical and business professionals, authors, scientists and others. A sampling of the panel members includes: Dr. Twila C. Liggett, Ten-time Emmy-winner, professor and founder of Reading Rainbow; Julie Aigner-Clark, Creator of Baby Einstein and The Safe Side Project; Jodee Blanco, New York Times Best-Selling Author; LeAnn Thieman, Motivational speaker and coauthor of seven Chicken Soup For The Soul books; Tara Paterson, Certified Parent Coach, and founder of The Just For Mom Foundation(tm) and the Mom's Choice Awards®. Parents and educators look for the Mom's Choice Awards® seal in selecting quality materials and products for children and families. This book has been honored by this distinguished award.

Rhythm, rhyme, nature, and counting mean this book offers something in the content areas of language arts, music, science, and math. But there's more! Author Marianne Berkes made sure her young readers would also experience many movement possibilities. As a children's physical activity specialist (author: A Running Start: How Play, Physical Activity and Free Time Create a Successful Child), I couldn't be more pleased with this inclusion! And if all that isn't reason enough to buy this book, Jeanette Canyon's incredible illustrations will help children fall in love with art.

Having worked professionally with children for many years, I've been privy to countless children's books. For the youngest children, I find routinely that vibrancy of imagery coupled with simplicity of the educational message is the best received.

'Over in the Jungle' is the best of both worlds. Plus it introduces a topic that is and will have more traction for the next generations: world climate/environment.

I could see this becoming a regular staple in young children's reading collections.

This book is great with music. The text is perfect with the traditional children's song "Over in the Meadow". Singing or chanting the song increases children's attention span and love for this fun, colorful book.

My students loved this book and returned to read it again and again. This book fit perfectly into our student of oceans unit.

My five year old son loved Over the Ocean in a Coral Reef so much we kept checking it out of the library. I finally purchased the book and also purchased Over in the Jungle. Both books are beautifully written but especially beautifully illustrated. I especially like the information in the back of the books about the animals depicted in the story. We have read the stories over and over none of us ever tire of reading them, nor looking at the beautiful illustrations.

My daughter loves ocean animals and to have a book helping her count as well, it's a winner.

This was a souvenir we purchased at the aquarium this past weekend that I felt compelled to review. What a great little book. It is a fun counting book that educates on undersea creatures while teaching numbers along the way. The illustrations are absolutely mesmerizing. When combined with the rhyming, even the busiest of toddlers will tune in. I am in absolute awe of the illustrations. What a clever twist (photographs of polymer clay) on the usual picture books. Will be picking up the talented illustrator's other books.

I was eight years old. I read the paperback edition of this book every night, cover to cover. The story of the effervescent Plop and the conquering of his fear of the dark is as enduring now as it was when it was first published over 30 years ago.

This version is abridged and illustrated from the one that saw me safely to dreamland as a child. No matter. The spirit is preserved and the illustrations are wonderful. Great for any kid with any phobia. A magical book.

The CD in English IS abridged. We first discovered Plop on cassette, and it ran 1 hour. This CD runs 20 minutes. It remains a delightful, short bedtime story for my 6 year old who has it memorized, but it IS abridged. I still would love to locate a truly unabridged CD that has the detail of the cassette.

I totally loved this book when i was little and still do now (I'm nearly 21!). I've lost the tape so I'm looking to get another one so I can show my boyfriend how good it is too. i would highly recommend that every child should have a copy of this book.

Originally published in 1968, "The Owl Who Was Afraid of the Dark" is considered a classic in England. Now reissued with a whole new illustrator, we members of the United States finally get a chance to read this rather adorable tale. Though not a cutesy story in and of itself, illustrator Paul Howard has drawn a book that has perhaps set the standard for adorable barn owl tales everywhere.

Plop (an unfortuanate name, but whatcha gonna do?) is a small barn owl. Plop is also afraid of the dark. Though his parents attempt to inform him that there is nothing to be afraid of, he remains unconvinced. Finally, they tell him to ask various people and animals for information about the dark. From a boy the owl learns that the dark is exciting, with fireworks and such. From an astrologer he learns that the dark is wondrous, allowing us to see the many constellations in the sky. And so forth. In the end, Plop is convinced and is able to safely fly in the sky with his mother and father without fear.

If you'd like to read something to your little one that doesn't contain much in the way of tension or drama, this book's your ticket. Though Plop does partake in various escapades, none of these ever become dangerous. I was particularly interested in a section where he asks a black cat about the night. Considering that a cat would undoubtedly view a baby barn owl as a yummy snack, I was a bit amazed that nothing bad happened between the two. Nothing so much as the cat licking his chops or thinking to himself, "Boy could I go for a little fowl right now". Nuthin'. Which is fine. Illustrator Paul Howard has added pictures drawn with pastel pencils. The result is that Plop is the fuzziest, cutest, cuddliest little fluffball of an owl to ever flutter across the pages of a picture book. In addition to being a useful book for children that are afraid of the dark, it is also a good story for convincing children that owls are nothing, in and of themselves, to be afraid of. Just don't pair this story with Avi's "Poppy". All in all, this is a sweet little story with fuzzy-wuzzy pictures. Cuddly and adorable all at once, it is certain to be a child's favorite as the years go by.

I am now 13 years old, and I still listen to this classic tape when I have nightmares at night. When I was little I used to listen to it every single night. I listened to it so much that I almost broke it. If you are a parent looking for a good childhood book for your child I highly recommend it, from firsthand experience of being a child. Thanks

I bought this together with Mama Mama and I found it to be a great book for daddy to read to our son and as he got older to learn about animals in nature where the daddies help care for the babies--just like with humans (wink (o;) He especially loved the wolf--howling at the moon together with daddy. It also worked out that my father in law was "Papa" not grandpa so this could very well be a nice gift for a new daddy or grandpa. Very tender and excellent illustrations of the animals in good board book format for those rough toddler years.

But a great addition to it, nonetheless. The pictures were awesome, but the rhymes were pretty forced. My kids always pick the pair (Mama, Mama and Papa, Papa)together!

This book delights my 1 year old son. You can read this book in about 3 minutes. We just keep reading it over and over again-he loves the repitition. Each time we read it, I add something to it--like counting how many animals are on the page, or making that animal's sounds, etc. There is one page that has a Papa monkey and the baby, and for some reason every time we get to it, the picture makes my son laugh. I know the words by heart now, and if at any point I just say, "Papa Papa", he will stop whatever he is doing and look at me. It makes him happy, and that makes me happy. So I recommend this book. I just ordered "Mama Mama" hoping it will be as good as this one.

This book is just so cute. It's an affirmation that a child and his or her papa can make over and over again attesting to the warmth, love and protection that only a father can give to his child. Goes very well with it's partner book, Mama, Mama. The refs to Attachment Parenting are obvious and I highly recommend this book to anyone who parents by instinct.

This book embraces the caring and lasting bond between father and child (just as Marzollo's "Mama Mama" does for mother and child.) I would definatley recommend this book and highly recommend getting it's companion, "Mama Mama." They are an amazing duo that will instill in your child the cherished relationship between parents and children.

Miss Read's novels capture the best aspects of the small town provincial novel--the sense of connection, the wry Austenisms--while leaving the sentimentality and pollyanna-ism sometimes afflicting the genre to her lesser imitators. A Peaceful Retirement brings us another step--perhaps a final step--nearer to the end of this series. I recommend this series, and this book within the series, to anyone who wishes that a novel might have both a 20th C. awareness and a somewhat 19th C. sense of perspective....Most people have not discovered Miss Read, and one somehow wonders if "most people" really ought to. But I am certainly glad that I did....

Miss Read has written over 40 titles, with this final tome describing how her headmistress heroine copes with her new-found life of leisure.

In an afterword, the author says she is laying down her pen "with a thankful heart". It is all the more surprising therefore that these final tales show no sign of staleness. In fact, "A Peaceful Retirement" is quite playful in tone as Miss Read copes valiantly with a series of unlooked-for marriage proposals.

Given that the school year is so regular the author manages to describe events such as Christmas celebrations and harvest festivals with no sense of repetition, and as ever captures the tensions between town and country living, children's and adult worlds and men and women beautifully.

With this book Dora Saint, the real-life Miss Read, can take her own retirement from authorship knowing that she has served her readers well.

I just finished reading "A Peaceful Retirement". Just like her other books, it was excellent reading. I was sorry when the book ended because I wanted to read more. Few years ago I wrote Miss Read a letter stating I loved all her books. She was kind enough to write me a handwritten letter in reply. After a hetic day, I look forward to reading her books and revisit the loveable characters in the quiet town.

I enjoyed this book just as much as I have all the other books written by Miss Read. The reason that I enjoyed this book so much was that it was like catching up with old friends and being transported back to the Village and all the surrounding scenery which captures my imagination. I recommend that you read not only this book but all those that Miss Read (Dora Saint) has written for anyone that enjoys people and a very descriptive story which includes the lovely countryside that one can only imagine. I will miss my friends very much. Thank You Dora Saint for giving me many hours of pleasure.

I just finished reading "A Peaceful Retirement". Just like her other books, it was excellent reading. I was sorry when the book ended because I wanted to read more. Few years ago I wrote Miss Read a letter stating I loved all her books. She was kind enough to write me a handwritten letter in reply. After a hetic day, I look forward to reading her books and revisit the loveable characters in the quiet town.

My son, who loves his hat, loves to substitute his name in for Peedie's. We have the entire family of Gossie and her Friends and never tire of them!!!!

My son absolutely loves this book especially the end where Peedie finds his lucky red baseball cap again. He now has a lucky red baseball cap of his own like Peedie.

My 6 month old daughter loves Peedie. She gets so excited when she sees the simple white cover with yellow Peedie and his special red hat. The pages are nice and simple and the story is also nice and short which should fare well for the upcoming toddler attention span! I am looking forward to picking up the rest of the Gossie and Friends books for her enjoyment.

This is the cutest book. The story is short and very simple. Each page has only one or two short sentences which will keep a small child from becoming too restless. If I read this book to my daughter I can usually count on reading it two or three times because whenever the story is over she says "more, more". It is such a cute story I don't mind reading it a few times. I am planning on buying a couple other books by the same author.

Right from the first two books about Gossie, my grandson and I were taken by Olivier Dunrea's books. They are colorful and uncluttered with simple honest lessons for little ones about sharing with friends and how no one is perfect. Peedie with his little red hat is no exception. I was able to read it to my grandson through our web cams and the pictures showed up beautifully.