My New Friend Is So Fun!

I have slight reservations about this elephant and piggie book since it's "on insecurities"; Gerald and Snake are worried that Piggie and Brian Bat won't want to be their friends anymore since they are having so much fun with each other. Which is totally psychologically real for ten-year-olds, or even fourteen-year-olds--I can remember that deep desire to introduce my two friends in whom I was so emotionally invested to each other and have them have so much fun combined with the imperfectly sublimated dread that they would have too much fun--but this is a book for toddlers, man.

Piggie and Gerald learn that new friends doesn't mean they have to break their friendship. It is a great read-aloud that teaches students the value of friendships and how jealousy can change a relationship. I liked to use it as the main idea/overall theme during my read-aloud. It was an easy instruction on reading with expression as well. Very funny too!

It can be nerve-wracking when your friends meet each other - what if they like each other more than they like you? In this case, Gerald and Snake have no cause to worry - Piggie and Brian Bat are still their respective best friends!

I adore the drawings of Snake, especially the one where his raised eyebrow is so far up it doesn't even touch the rest of him.

Oh dear. Competition to be the 'best' friend? I don't think that's cool. I'd much rather see the lesson made clear that *everyone* can be friends together.

Reread 14 months later ... must've been in a bad mood the time I reacted as above ... it's fine, especially if you look at the end papers (which of course you must always do with E&P books to find Pigeon) ... gave it another star.

Elephant and Piggie are a funny pair, and a little neurotic it seems.
With the text entirely comprised of dialogue bubbles, and the characters pictured against a blank backdrop, the reader can really focus on inflection and fluency; it also leaves room for inferring.

Gerald and Piggie are best friends who love to have fun together. However, he grows concerned that he is being replaced when Piggie meets Brian Bat and starts to spend time with him. Funny and sweet, this book is perfect to have on hand in the classroom. Students will laugh as Gerald grows increasingly more nervous and increasingly more determined to tell Piggie that he can’t be friends with Brian. This book reminds students of the classic saying, make new friends but keep the old.

*** This review is for the entire series, rather than an individual book, and will be posted on each book***

My youngest child LOVES Mo Willems books! We have almost all of the Elephant and Piggie collection, several of the Pigeon books, and a few others by Mo as well.

My daughter has memorized almost ALL of these books... when we read nightly, she mouths along...her favorite way to read them, however, is through interactive reading....she will assign us each a character to read. These are a highly read, even though she knows them all verbatim, she never tires of them, and will choose them over other books.

I highly recommend these!!