Francine Patterson

Koko is the best gorilla ever. This is an interesting book written relatively early on in the experiment that taught a gorilla to communicate with humans and with other gorillas using ASL. It is incredible to get so close to Koko, to read about her thoughts, emotions, her sense of humor. While the subject matter rates at least a "5", the book really drags on in places and repeats itself quite a bit despite the experienced co-author. Still, worth a read for sure.

In 1972 Dr. Francine Patterson began to explore the question of whether a gorilla could learn to communicate through sign language. The story of how Penny won Koko’s trust and gradually began to teach her words is told in her first book, Koko’s Story. This book continues the story of Koko, who, as of the time of this book’s writing in 1986, had learned about 500 words, using over 100 different ones every day. [By the time of Koko’s death in 2018, Dr. Patterson reported that Koko had show more an active vocabulary of more than 1,000 signs, and understood approximately 2,000 words of spoken English.]

In this book, written in 1985, Dr. Patterson tells us about Koko’s pet kitten whom she named “All Ball.” Dr. Patterson writes: “It is a story in which Koko the gorilla tells us about herself in a language that expresses love, anger, sorrow, and joy.”

It was Koko herself who asked for a cat for her birthday present, and finally got a kitten.

Adorable photographs chronicle the growing relationship between Koko and All Ball. At one point, Dr. Patterson signed to Koko “Tell me a story about Ball.” Koko signed back, “Koko love Ball.”

One morning, All Ball got hit by a car and died instantly. Dr. Patterson explained to Koko that she would never see Ball again. Koko signed "Bad, sad, bad" and "Frown, cry, frown, sad, trouble.”

“‘Ten minutes later,’ she wrote, ‘I heard Koko cry. It was her distress call - a loud, long series of high-pitched hoots.’”

Finally, three months later, they found another kitten. Koko would not let go of it. “‘Baby,’ she signed. Koko was happy. Her new kitten had come to stay.”

Evaluation: This heart-warming story should convince doubters that primates aren’t as different from us as many believe. show less

THE EDUCATION OF KOKO by Francine Patterson and Eugene Linden is nonfiction about a gorilla named Koko who was raised to speak by sign language. The book is full of interesting facts and great pictures, but it was a disappointment. I expected that it would be Koko's and the authors' story. Instead, it is more a discussion of language abilities and a report of their "experiment" to teach language to a nonhuman species.

Please don't be put off if these facts interest you and it doesn't matter show more to you that this project has a story to tell. It matters to me. So I would have liked to see these facts presented differently.

As it is, THE EDUCATION OF KOKO is not engaging enough to make a reader delight in it. And that's what I thought it would be and so easily could have been. All these details could have been included in the story of the experiment and the growing relationship between Koko and her humans (and her kitty). show less

A true story of the gorilla named Koko who was taught sign language and more than anything wanted a cat. His teacher is scared that Koko will harm any real cat, so she gives him a fake one for Christmas and Koko is devastated. After much sadness she decides to try and see how the a real cat and Koko would interact and finds that Koko is a loving animal owner. This is a wonderful touching story for kids of all ages!