by Jennifer Armstrong
illustrated by David Small
48 pages / 2013
I’d almost forgotten just how wonderful wordless books can be. But then I found this at the library, brought it home, read it once to my three girls, and then, moments later, my youngest, all of three, was off on her own “reading” the book to herself.
The fact is, long before kids can read, many really, really want to. Parents might find them, picture book on their lap, either trying to remember how the story goes, or trying to make up something that will fit the pictures. And all the while, just wishing they could read it for themselves.
Wordless books are a way to build on this enthusiasm. I did need to go through Once Upon A Banana the first time with them, pointing out things like how banana peels are supposed to be slippery, and how the book was giving us hints as to what was coming, by showing us some characters in full color, and the less important characters only in shades of blue.
But they didn’t need much to figure it out. The story is one big chase scene, with monkey owner chasing monkey, and then grocer chasing monkey owner, and then some dogs join the chase, and a skateboarding judge, and a mom and her baby in its stroller. Oh, and there’s a big garbage truck in the mix too. It’s crazy and frantic with lots to look at on every page.
After I gave a short “lesson” on how to read this wordless book, my two pre-readers could do it all on their own. That means that, while wordless books aren’t going to replace me any time soon, they do reduce the demand just a tad on Dad the book reader. And that freed me up to read something a bit more challenging, and at least a little bit closer to my own level, to my older girls.
The only downside to wordless books is that they take hardly any time to read. That means this isn’t the best value for a parent – it’d be better to get it out of the library. But this is a good one for a school library. You can get it at Amazon.ca here and Amazon.com here.
And for more wordless wonders, see the reviews below on ReallyGoodReads.com:
