★ 05/18/2015
For youngest science lovers, Robin Page's (My First Day) enticing introduction to chickens explains their habitat, anatomy, diet and predators.
June 16, 2015 - Shelf Awareness
What would you do if a chicken followed you home? How would you know what kind of chicken you have? How would you feed it? These are just some of the questions posed by the unnamed narrator in this nonfiction picture book for young readers. Using a question-and-answer format, this selection offers concise facts about what chickens eat, their life cycle, and other interesting information. Each page offers visually attractive illustrations, boldfaced questions, and boldfaced key words (e.g., chick , egg ). The back matter includes additional questions about chickens.
August 17, 2015 - Literacy Daily
A chicken followed me home! What do I do now?” Ever had that desperate feeling? Here Page takes readers’ questions about the bird and gives simple answers to each question. The questions she poses (from the viewpoint of a child) include the essential question of what a chicken eats to general curiosity questions, such as how to distinguish between a hen and a rooster, how to determine its breed, how to keep the animals safe, will it lay eggs (and, if so, how many), and what if I want baby chicks? The answers are given in a straightforward manner using vocabulary a child understands. The book’s bright, bold, colorful illustrations often cover a two-page spread and will draw in younger audiences, while older children will like the illustrations and be intrigued by the facts. Back matter includes more questions and answers about chickens and a short bibliography. A great book for families with backyard chickens.
This straightforward introduction to chickens is a lesson in book design of young informational books. Lots of white space allows the exemplar chicken, a Rhode Island Red, plenty of room; she (and the book clearly explains how to tell the males from the females) is generally pictured at about half life-sized. Each page or spread asks (“How long does it take an egg to become a chick?”) and answers (“If a fertilized egg is kept warm and turned regularly, a chick will hatch in about 21 days”) just one question about chickens and their care, and the sequence of questions is logical, with each answer building on what’s come before. The Photoshop illustrations are warm and unclinical but spare and always attentive to the particular topic under review. A closing spread offers a slightly more advanced set of chicken questions (“Why do chickens have combs?”) and a neat, brief directory of other sources for information. Sophie in Unusual Chickens for the Exceptional Poultry Farmer , reviewed on page 111, would’ve found the practical information here extremely useful.
May/June 2015 - Horn Book Magazine
Sure,kids may know what to do with a stray puppy or kitten, but what if a chickenfollows them home? Page treats this appealing fictional problem, helpfullygiving audiences answers to some basic questions (“What kind of chicken isit?”), providing information on chickens and their care, highlighting a few ofthe many breeds, and very briefly covering such topics as food, safety andshelter, gender identification, egg laying, and chick raising. Furtherinformation on chicken history, physical traits, and a chick’s developmentinside the egg, as well as a short list of resources and websites, areappended. The information given here isn’t detailed enough to set a kid up as achicken farmer, but it’s a concise and inviting introduction to chickens, andthe “chicken followed me home” premise is an amusing angle. The layout anddigital illustrations (rendered in Photoshop) are simple, with rich,marbleized-looking reds and blacks stunningly creating the plumage of thetagalong chicken (a Rhode Island Red hen). Large figures and clean compositionswith plenty of white space make this great for group sharing, while the brieftext, clear fonts, and simple vocabulary will put this within readalone rangefor older primary-graders as well. Families considering embarking on thebackyard poultry movement or classrooms raising chicks would want to supplementthis with more detailed resources, but as a very first introduction to chickensand their care it would be hard to beat this. In addition, its brevity,striking artwork, and question/answer format will make it a winner with thestorytime crowd.
September 2015 - Bulletin of the Center for Children's Books
A chicken followed me home! What do I do now?” Ever had that desperate feeling? Here Page takes readers’ questions about the bird and gives simple answers to each question. The questions she poses (from the viewpoint of a child) include the essential question of what a chicken eats to general curiosity questions, such as how to distinguish between a hen and a rooster, how to determine its breed, how to keep the animals safe, will it lay eggs (and, if so, how many), and what if I want baby chicks? The answers are given in a straightforward manner using vocabulary a child understands. The book’s bright, bold, colorful illustrations often cover a two-page spread and will draw in younger audiences, while older children will like the illustrations and be intrigued by the facts. Back matter includes more questions and answers about chickens and a short bibliography. A great book for families with backyard chickens.
★ 02/01/2015
2015-01-20
