Book Talk Tuesday - 100 层房子 Review + Giveaway!

When Dumpling first saw the cover (upside down and from a distance) she was confused and trotted over immediately. After seeing the cover the right way up (because the book, though printed in landscape, needs to be read in a portrait format), she went "哦！原来是房子。很好笑， 很有趣!"

:: The story
Written by Japanese Author,Toshio Iwa, the story heads off to a mysterious start when Tochi (多奇), receives an invitation to a 100-storey house. With the invitation comes a trail of questions and thoughts - 这是谁写的呢？(Who wrote this?)  这里以前明明没有房子呀。(The house certainly did not exist previously.)

The adventure was too good to pass off and Tochi decided to accept the invitation and explore!

Upon arriving at the 100-storey house, he was flabbergasted as he could not even see the top of the building! Who stays in this house? Tochi bravely entered and started on his little adventure.

He soon discovers that there are many tenants in this house and every 10 storeys comes a set of animals / insects as tenants.

When Dumpling and I first read this together, we had to stop at level 40 and call it a night as it was bedtime. The next morning, immediately upon waking, Dumpling grabbed the title and turned on the light to read on. She was most anxious to find out who the mysterious host was. :)

:: Illustration
The illustration in this title is quirky and fun. Every 10-storey has its unique features in what is a suitable home for the tenants. From foliage for the family of frogs...

To a hive of bees

And my favorite family of bats (and how everything is upside down!) This was clearly Dumpling's favorite too as she pored over this page for some time, looking through the various activities each 'storey' was engaged in.

Certainly a delightful read for children, this title is wonderful as a read aloud for children from 2YO. To read independently (though font size is a tad small), I would think that it is suitable for 6YO onwards. Regardless of which age group, I'd imagine your children will have loads of fun following the various scenes from each storey and to finally being able to discover who the host is. :)

I am pleased to share that Read with Me Mommy is sponsoring one copy of this title (hardcover!) for a giveaway. :)

Earn credits using Rafflecopter below:

a Rafflecopter giveaway

 (For Singapore residents only)

The more credits you earn, the higher your chances! :)

That's not all! Just for Beanie N Us readers, you stand to enjoy a 10% savings when you key in this code BEANIENUS at the checkout! 

If you have enjoyed this post, please follow me on my Facebook Page where I share my parenting thoughts, food photos (be prepared for tons of them!), early shout outs for giveaways and interact with you, my readers! You can also follow me on Pinterest and Instagram! 

Disclosure: I received a copy of 100 层房子 for the purpose of the review and to share my experience. 

Nurturing a love for Chinese #1 - READ READ READ!

I have been asked numerous times on how do I nurture Dumpling's interest in Chinese especially when mine is a 'mixed' marriage and the hubs is not really all that good in the language. (*cough cough* that's kinda putting it mildly). So here's starting a series 1 of 10 (tips) that I have.

:: READ, READ, READ AND MAKE IT FUN!

Many of my friends are sending the kiddos for Chinese enrichment and that's great. One thing that I do is to encourage them to read LOADS to their children and the earlier you start, the better. To this date, I recall the look of utter confusion on Dumpling's face when I first read a Chinese story to her.

In our usual fashion every evening, I'd sit her down and read aloud to her since young. At 16/17 months, I decided to pick up a Chinese title and read out to her. Suddenly, she looked up, frowned at me and asked me "Mama, what?" That was when I first freaked out and understood the arduous journey ahead of us in mastering the Chinese language.

Some comments / replies I get when I advise parents to read aloud to their kids:

- My kiddo is just not interested! He'd run around / walk away when I read any Chinese titles

My advice is to continue to read aloud because some children are not visual learners. What we are trying to do is to expose the child to the sound of the language, vocabulary and sentence structure. If possible, perhaps you can have the read aloud in an enclosed area (a room or in very young children, play yard).

Vary in your intonation and inject some 'life' as you read. Make it fun for your children. You can even extend to craft work after the read aloud. You can make story boxes or do shadow play too.

- I do not know the language so how am I able to read aloud to my child? 

Audio books will come in really handy in this case. You can also invest in one of those talking pens for the same purpose. I recently came across a really neat website that has online books and some are on a 'read to me' mode (uses flash)

Here's one of Snow White 白雪公主

- My child walks away the moment she sees that it is a Chinese title. What do I do?

For young children, I'd encourage brightly colored illustrations and to make it more interactive and fun, lift the flaps are always good too.

One thing which worked very well for us has been for the kiddo to read the translated titles (to Chinese of course) of some English stories. The idea is that if the kiddo has read the English titles before, they'd find it familiar and less resistant to it. Some of the translated titles which Dumpling enjoys are:

:: Mr. Men and Little Miss

Same characters (79 titles in all) with the same funny tales - it was a good way to ease Dumpling into lengthier titles in Chinese. Plus with all the names of the characters being translated, it is also great for them to be exposed to good vocabulary.

:: Curious George

Everyone's favourite monkey - George! Dumpling was able to recognise the same starting sentence 这是乔治 after only a few titles. She enjoys George's crazy antics in the English version and the Chinese copies were no different.

Being the chocolate lover that she is, it was easy for her to fall in love with this title: George and the Chocolate factory. She learnt how to say 'strawberry filled chocolates' in mandarin amongst many other terms too!

Being the dog lovers that we are, she also enjoyed another title on dogs 

:: Elmer

Elmer is another lovely series which Dumpling read when she was around 3+ or so. There is a certain cheekiness to the stories in this series which would have her giggling. With the colorful illustrations, this series is a 'winner'. When I showed her the Chinese titles, there was no resistance at all as it was 'familiar' to her and she was once again captivated with Elmer 艾玛 and his cousin 韦伯 (Wilbur).

Funny storyline like the above would have Dumpling chuckling out loud too

This is part of a 5-part series:
Part 2: Speak it, Use it!
Part 3: Watch it!
Part 4: Play It!
Part 5: Write it! (小书 Small Book)

Linking up:

If you have enjoyed this post, please follow me on my Facebook Page where I share my parenting thoughts, food photos (be prepared for tons of them!), early shout outs for giveaways and interact with you, my readers! You can also follow me on Pinterest and Instagram! 

Book Talk Tuesday - 自己的颜色 (A Color of His Own - Leo Lionni)

Leo Lionni is one of our favorite authors at home as his books were amongst one of the first few that Dumpling started reading when she was able to read independently. From a parental viewpoint, I like that his titles caters to the different preschool ages. From simple titles such as Fish is Fish to wordier award winning ones such as Inch by Inch, Alexander and the Wind Up Mouse and Frederick, etc., we did not have a lack of stories to choose from. 

We had the chance, recently, to review some classic titles which have been translated to Chinese and 'A Color of His Own' was one of them. 

Like the English title, Dumpling enjoyed the Chinese version too. The story centres around a chameleon which has no 'permanent' colour of his own. Instead, the chameleon is able to change its colour to match its surroundings. It went on a journey to look for ways to have its own colour and found companionship and friendship along the way. 

The illustrations remain true to the English version where the colours of the various animals are bright and attractive. The story also introduces children to the simple concept of colours in short simple sentences. 

Dumpling enjoys the fact that she is able to now read this title almost independently. The wordier pages are only about 3 - 4 sentences long (as below) so it is manageable for the older preschoolers. 

What I enjoyed was that the story also uses good vocabulary and beautiful descriptive terms such as '冬天的寒风‘ 肩并肩‘, which I feel is great exposure. Though translated to Chinese, the title does not disappoint and in essence, delivers the beauty of the tale and more. A great title for toddler as a read aloud and for the older preschoolers to attempt reading independently! 

Now, I am pleased to share that Read with Me Mommy is sponsoring one copy of this title (hardcover) for a giveaway! 

Earn credits using Rafflecopter below:

a Rafflecopter giveaway

(For Singapore residents only)

The more credits you earn, the higher your chances! :)

That's not all! Just for Beanie N Us readers, you stand to enjoy a 10% savings when you key in this code BEANIENUS at the checkout! 

If you have enjoyed this post, please follow me on my Facebook Page where I share my parenting thoughts, food photos (be prepared for tons of them!), early shout outs for giveaways and interact with you, my readers! You can also follow me on Pinterest and Instagram! 

Disclosure: I received a copy of 自己的颜色 for the purpose of the review and to share my experience. 

For the fun and love of reading - Chinese books: 小小孩影院

As most of you are aware, Dumpling attends Chinese classes and I homeschool the rest. However, like all languages, I believe in the 'use it or lose it' phrase so I am also very mindful that the home environment plays an important part. Hence we read and read a lot and I do try to read 1-2 Chinese titles with her daily (on weekdays) to support that exposure with simple titles such as this when she was young. 

Through reading, I believe that Dumpling builds up a wider range of vocabulary. These days she is more expressive and says things such as "我用我的牛力，他向着我扑过来"，etc. Hence I believe in stocking up on good books. 

I personally like fairy tales as the stories are usually fun and interesting. In this post, I would like to share with you a series of titles that Dumpling enjoys ever since she was young. 

This series consists of many titles and includes many of the famous tales such as:

《皇帝新衣》Emperior's New Clothes
《木偶奇遇记》Pinocchio
《白雪公主》 Snow White
《小红帽》 Little Red Riding Hood
《拔萝卜》The Enormous Turnip

《三只小猪》Three Little Pigs, etc. 

What Dumpling enjoys are that the stories are short and simple yet the illustrations, bright and colourful. Instead of the usual drawings, the illustrations are actually that of clay figurines, giving it a 3D feel. :)  

The figurines also spot cute features - Grandma with a toothy grin, wolf with big googly eyes, etc. Though I am not a big fan of Han Yu Pin Yin, for parents who need a little help along, it has that above the text. 

The storyline is also kept simple and easily digestible so that young children are able to grasp it easily...

What I also like is that in the series, it consists of lesser known titles such as:

《渔夫和金鱼>>, <<司马光>>

which explain on values such as perseverance, contentment, etc. 

I feel that this series is suitable for even up to 6YO: as a read aloud resource when the child is young and for the child to attempt to read during the K1/K2 years. 

In case you are keen to find out more, I bought this series of titles from Dangdang and went through a Spree Organiser as the collection point is very near my place. 

Till my next post, "Happy reading and have a blessed  week ahead!"

For the fun and love of reading - Chinese titles!

As I was going through my cupboards, I thought I would take some photos and share some of the Chinese titles Dumpling and I have read over the past few years. :)

This set is below was something which Dumpling enjoyed when she was much younger.

It is a hardcover series and the "lift the flap" concept makes it interactive for Dumpling. It comes in a set of eight and I bought these at the Book Fest in Suntec City. Here's a quick look at this series:

The illustrations are bright and colourful. Most pages have only one sentence of text and the font size is big and bold for easy reading.

 

Besides lifting the flaps, the pages also incorporate other cute concepts - below is a page from a swimming title and the child is able to "turn" a circular layer to mimick the swirling water in the pool

The series shares some basic general knowledge too. For e.g. the title below touches on some information and introduces simple verbs on the various modes of transporation.

Before lifting the flap...

Scene changes after turning the flap over

This series has my vote for introducing Chinese to younger children of 2 and below where you are not into the technicalities of word recognition but for read aloud moments. :)