Candace Whitman

"lines that wiggle, lines that bend, wavy lines from end to end. lines that tickle, lines that sprout, bugs have lines that stick right out." And so begins Candace Whitman's Lines that Wiggle, a rhyming picture-book with a sparkly blue thread running through it. Whether it's the curly line of a tail, or the zigzag lines of a lightning bolt, the line itself is the focus of both text and illustration.

A brightly colored little book, with a jaunty rhythm and quirky artwork, this is less of a show more story than it is a nonsense-rhyme, and would be an ideal choice for reading out loud. The sparkling embellishments and thick pages make it a tactile pleasure as well. Well worth the time of any young reader with a taste for Seuss-like wordplay, or a weakness for sparkles. show less

The book Zoo-Looking by Mem Fox is a great book to start teaching very young students the science process school of observation. The book is about a little girl named Flora who goes to the zoo with her father. While at the zoo, Flora observes a lot of different animals. With some of the animals she makes comments about what they look like, and with some of the animals she watches them looking at her. The pictures are beautifully illustrated and bright and would capture the imagination of any show more young student. The sentences are short and the vocabulary is easy to understand.
I would definitely reserve this book for students from pre-kindergarten age to about 1st grade. I think if it was used for students any older than that it would be boring and redundant. Students could easily be taught how to look at other objects, specifically animals, and make simple observations about that animal. It would be useful in teaching them descriptive adjectives and perhaps inspire them to look more closely at their surroundings. show less

Star off for normalizing traditional zoos. Terrific pattern to the rhyming text, though.

I have mixed feelings about this book after reading it. I like the book because it is a simple book for young children to help them learn their animals. The big idea in this book is to teach children the names of animals, and it goes through 14 animals that would be found in a zoo. It repeats the phrase “she looked at the (animal) and the (animal) looked back” on almost every other page. This repetition helps children to be able to memorize the book, thus helping them to associate the show more animal names to the illustrations. I don't like the book because it seems outdated and, in my opinion, does not have appealing illustrations. The language in the book is timeless, however, the illustrations cause it to seem old. I feel as if cleaner and crisper drawings and more realistic looking characters would have enhanced the text much more. Overall, this book is mediocre, and I feel as if better books on the topic of animals could be found. show less