27 April 2012

book loving :: a review + giveaway!

Untitled

Tiny Owlet loves books. They are her most favourite thing at the moment, along with the everyday tools she sees us using around the house. Little Owlet and Big Owlet love reading too. All sorts of books and books in different languages are a treat at the moment as they try to make sense of letters and words used in an unfamiliar way...

Untitled

So, when I was asked to receive and review some books from Glottogon, I jumped at the chance. We do love receiving books in the mail...

Untitled

Especially ones so beautifully wrapped...

Untitled

First out of the parcel was a bundle of board books and flash cards, in English. The larger books appealed to Tiny and Little Owlet most, with titles like My Body, My Week and My Manners. Big Owlet happily read them to her sisters. Generally they enjoyed the bright, fun pictures and liked to point out things within them, answering basic comprehension questions at the back. I must say that the book about manners brought on a bunch of eye rolling and eyebrow raising from the older owlets, who are particularly suss about coercive parenting, but they enjoyed the pictures all the same, and the discussion that ensued.

Untitled

The flash cards provided some fun and discussion for them too. Flash cards are fairly new concept for the owlets, as we don't generally use them at home, but they thought flicking through the pictures and passing them around was pretty fun.

Untitled

The little board books appealed to Tiny Owlet who loved their size and the colours used within the pictures. The books are particularly light, having a foam core which makes them ideal to pop in my bag for entertaining Tiny while we're out... although I wonder at the environmental effects of using foam for books... I would love to see these books in another language as I think they'd be really useful to all the owlets in that form. Their simplicity and lovely pictures would work marvelously in that format.

Untitled

Most exciting to us was the bundle of books written in French. We've been slowly introducing the Owlets to the French language, in daily conversation. Huz has been learning French using Rosetta Stone and I'm enjoying reviewing my snippets of knowledge... We loved seeing The Very Hungry Caterpillar there, giving new life to a firm favourite. The books aimed at Big Owlet are terrific, giving us something to nut out and work through together...

Untitled

And this board book intended for Tiny Owlet is totally hilarious!

Untitled

She, however is just lost in her total and utter love for books. I'm sure we'll come to know all these Glottogon books well over the coming months as they are shoved under our noses to read over, and over, and over.... I think we'll be wandering back to the Glottogon website to feed her book love over the years, and offer some awesome alternative language learning for all our Owlets. The website looks really useable and full of great titles, so I look forward to getting to know it.

If you'd like to have a chance to get to know the Glottogon range and website, we've been really lucky to have been given a $50 gift voucher code to give away to one lucky reader! Yay! All you have to do is leave a comment with this post, telling me your owlets' favourite books, in any language. I'll draw a winner next Friday afternoon. Best of luck!!

**************

You can find Glottogon on their website, or on Facebook or Twitter. They also have a really handy Youtube channel where you can preview all their DVDs. 


The giveaway is only available to Australian residents... Sorry overseas readers!


While I received these books to review, I was not paid to provide comments in this post. All comments are my own.

25 comments:

  1. My children love an Aboriginal story book called When The Snake Bites The Sun. They also love Dr Suess books, Mr Men and Enid Blyton books. Thankyou for the opportunity to win; we are all bookworms!!

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Ooh I'll have to look up when the snake bites the sun. Dr Seuss and Mr Men are firm faves around here too :)

      Delete
  2. That is so cool that you are learning French! I love the language, it flows so nicely. I learnt some German at school, which is a bit more aggressive in tone, and it is amazing how quickly you lose it if you don't use it. Not to mention there are three different "the"s depending if the object is female/male/neutral. Gah!! I may have to brush up on it so I can start teaching The Littles now I have read this post.
    Favourite books in this house is Interrupting Chicken (even you havent read it, I highly recommend it), Emily Brown and The Thing, and whatever we get from the library. At the moment, it is a lot to do with chickens and fairies. If I can find Imp a book about a chicken fairy, I think I may be exulted to the realm of supermum in her eyes ..... let me know if you find any ;)

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Will look up Interrupting Chicken... sounds like a book about Little Owlet ;) Oh and I love Emily Brown... Maybe you could write a Chicken Fairy book? Sounds like your little one's onto a winner there!

      Delete
  3. Je parle français

    Well, not really since Grade 1, but it's the one language that my girl has actually shown an interest in. It would be great to learn together :) Her books of choice at the moment are the 'Olivia' range (it's really like reading about herself!). We've just read a book about Coco Chanel, so of course I had to do a French accent at the appropriate moments, as I have to do with any French characters in any books. She thinks it's fabulous dahhhhling! ;)

    And yes, that pic of Tiny is TOTALLY hilarious!!!! XD

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Olivia is fab. I love that Coco Chanel book too... Do tell me you've read Fancy Nancy and Eloise? OOoooh! I just love Eloise! Especially when she goes to Paris!

      Delete
  4. Tara is fascinated with other languages! And french is one we have been practicing a little! We have also been learning counting in Danish, French and Italian.

    We Tara is also obsessed with reading and books of all sorts! she sleeps with them under her pillow!!

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Oh, Bless! My sister used to do that too. She'd cuddle books to sleep instead of teddies :)

      Delete
  5. My kids are learning to count in French, German and when we travel south, Japanese! But their favourite books at the moment are The Lorax and How To Train Your Dragon. Those books look ever so awesome! You sure scored a good review job there!

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Brilliant choices! Big and Little Owlet seem to have learnt how to count in Spanish... I think we'll all try and learn that next!

      Delete
  6. My son's favourite book is Dinotrux, EVERY SINGLE NIGHT before bed he gets me to read it and about 10 times during the day! My daughter is really enjoying Mem Fox books at the moment.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. I have not heard of Dinotrux! It must be pretty ace though.... Love Mem Fox. Possum Magic is an all-time fave.

      Delete
  7. Aidan is a bit young for anything too long or complicated, but he really loves rhythm and rhyme with bold illustrations. He loves "Hello Baby" and "10 Little Fingers and 10 Little Toes". He's in pointing mode at the moment so anything with nice clear pictures of animals and objects is a winner at the moment too. I love the idea of kids books in other languages for early exposure. I'd really love us all to learn Japanese. How does the Huz find Rosetta Stone? I'd love to start learning at home.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Big Owlet is super keen on Japanese and we all want to travel there, so with you on that one. Tiny is all about animal books right now. Particularly farms. Oh we read them over and over! Huz is doing really well with Rosetta Stone! He's got some basic phrases down, which is a great start. Finding time is tricky though, so he sets it aside when the owlets are pottering around. Sometimes they join him and learn along with him :)

      Delete
    2. Japan is the very best place to travel with kids! We took Aidan when he was just 5 months old and had the most wonderful time. I can envisage us returning with older kids. Can't wait to take them to the Ghibli museum!

      Delete
  8. My wee one's firm favourite is 'Where is the Green Sheep?' although he is less interested in the outcome of the narrative than the pointing out of features along the way. My favourite kids book to read to him (as it helps for the book to have an appeal to the adult reading as well...), is 'The Staring Owl' by Luke Edwards, about an owl brought up ignorant of the understanding that staring is considered rude, and who has trouble finding a vocation which will allow him to fully utilise his talents for staring.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Oh that book sounds great! I must track it down! We are at the *any book with lift-the-flaps* stage here with Tiny. I'm so looking forward to story books with her, but for now, excited pointing and making sounds is just lovely :)

      Delete
  9. Ohh books! My two love books! :) So I'm judging favourites by by the fact they *must* be read before bed every single night.

    Fergie (3 1/2):
    Baby Wombat's Week by Jackie French
    If I Built a Car by Chris Van Dusen
    Fox in Socks Dr Suess
    The Bike Lesson Bearenstein (?sp) Bears

    Oscar (2):
    Where's Tumpty by Polly Dunbar
    Dinosaur Roar
    Go Dog, Go! Dr Suess series but not authored by him

    ReplyDelete
  10. Dr Seuss is a definate fave here at the moment. Especially "The Foot Book". Maisy Mouse also gets a good look in too! There is so much fun to be had with books. Even more so now that they are used as low flying projectiles less and less now :)

    ReplyDelete
  11. We indulge in a little conversational French and Japanese here too, and now and then a little Tibetan.

    My Owlet :D likes comics and graphic novels particularly Amelia Rules and Sailor Moon - the latter was a real source of discussion because it had to be read back to front! She also likes the Clarice Bean novels by Lauren Child.

    I loved what you wrote about getting simple board books in other languages...if only I'd thought of that eight years ago!

    ReplyDelete
  12. Hi,

    Our favourite books at the moment are Hairy Mclairy Shoo, Hairy Mclairy's Rumpus at the Vet and Slinky Malinky opens the door. I enjoy reading the books and little one loves them. He has a particular order he likes them read and would happily have the entire Hairy Mclairy series read each night. When we are out and about we look for the dog characters.

    I am very interested in teaching little one and myself another language what is the Rosetta Stone?
    Emma

    ReplyDelete
  13. My littlest owlet loves B is for Bear and anything else that has tactile things. We also have individual letter books that she loves! My older owl loves ALL books, LOL. ~Tracy

    ReplyDelete
  14. Our little one is obsessed with anything by Alison Lester but his firm favourite at the moment is: Are we there yet? Our day is interspersed with multiple readings, exclamations of are-we-there-yet-mum?! (we aren't on our way anywhere at the time) and a sung version: la la la la are we THERE yet, the origin of which I am uncertain... cultural osmosis? :-)

    ReplyDelete
  15. I love the hungry caterpillar, its a fun book with hours of enjoyment!!!
    makes me hungry after xx

    ReplyDelete
  16. Owlet Mr 5 loves nothing more than 'There was an old women who swallowed a fly'. Who wouldn't love it? Its hilarious for a kids!

    Owlet Mr 3 just loves anything that looks like a book. He doesn't mind if it Dr Seuss, Touch and Feel, trucks, etc.

    They both love books as much as I do so lucky for me not only do they enjoy it but they are learning from it too :)

    ReplyDelete

Share your thoughts...