How to Be a Friend (Dino Tales: Life Guides for Families) - Hardcover

Krasny Brown, Laurie

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0316109134 ISBN 13: 9780316109130

Publisher: Little, Brown Books for Young Readers, 1998

Synopsis

The newest "Dino Life Guide for Families", this book talks about friendship. A reassuring text combined with humorous, full-color illustrations show everyday situations that children can relate to and understand. Best of all, this book presents the many ways to be a friend as well as the ways not to.

About this title

About the Author

Laurie Krasny Brown is a fine artist as well as author, educator, and parent committed to providing answers to the questions children have about real-life issues. She has written many books, including How to Be a Friend, When Dinosaurs Die, and Dinosaurs Divorce from the popular Dino Tales: Life Guides for Families series. She lives with her husband, illustrator Marc Brown, in New York City and Tisbury, Massachusetts.

Reviews

Kindergarten-Grade 3-Similar in style to the Browns' Dinosaurs Divorce (Atlantic Monthly, 1986), this picture book offers kids practical suggestions about resolving arguments, getting over being shy, handling bossy children and bullies, and more. The easy-to-read text contains many examples of how to be a friend, each paired with a picture of two or more dinosaurs in that particular situation. For example, "You can protect a friend if someone starts bothering him" is illustrated with a dinosaur saying, "Stop it! Leave him alone!" to a bully. Marc Brown's colorful, whimsical cartoons are integral to the appeal of the book. The front endpapers feature suggestions from a third-grade class on "Ways to Be a Friend" ("Be helpful," "Take turns," etc.) along with drawings of happy dinosaur faces, while at the back, "Ways Not to Be a Friend" ("Make mean faces," "Call them a name they don't like," etc.) are illustrated with grumpy faces. While there are many wonderful stories that deal with friendship, few give direct advice to children about what to do and what not to do. Sure to be a hit without hitting readers over the head with message.
Esther C. Ball, Carver Elementary School, Newport News, VA
Copyright 1998 Reed Business Information, Inc.

Though several of their earlier Dino Life Guides for Families have dealt with issues that are ostensibly weightier (death, divorce), the Browns are clearly tuned in to children's universal belief that having friends and feeling included are matters of paramount importance. Here they offer common-sense advice to help preschoolers and early elementary students form social habits that will serve them well in subsequent years, when relationships with peers can be so much more complicated and potentially unsettling. Concrete examples, addressed directly to the reader and cheerfully illustrated with voice-bubble cartoons starring likable dinos, make both positive and negative concepts easy to grasp. The Browns balance "Ways to be a friend" (share, stand up for your pal when people make fun of him, go along with another's idea about what to play, compliment a playmate "even when she wins and you lose") with "Ways not to be a friend" (blame others for mishaps, quit when you're losing, insist that a friend play with you only). Spotlighting some unavoidable trouble spots, they impart valuable tactics for coping with rejection, shyness, arguments, etc. Text and art work well together to underscore the book's bottom line, that being a friend "means treating others the way you would like them to treat you!" Ages 4-8.
Copyright 1998 Reed Business Information, Inc.

Ages 5^-8. From the authors of Dinosaurs Die and What's the Big Secret?, here's a very practical resource about the ins and outs of friendship. Ink drawings washed with bright colors provide lively scenes of dressed, humanoid dinosaurs (or, perhaps, people with green skin and tails) learning the ins and outs of friendship. Topics include feeling shy, approaching others in a friendly way, dealing with bossy kids and bullies, talking through arguments, and making up after a quarrel. While the authors are presenting their sound advice, the cartoon-like characters are talking too, through speech balloons that make the same points in more accessible ways and express the characters' feelings clearly. Parents and primary-grade teachers looking for materials on friendship will find this a good complement to the many picture books about friends. Carolyn Phelan

Edition details

• Publisher: Little, Brown Books for Young Readers
• Publication date: 1998
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 0316109134
• ISBN 13: 9780316109130
• Binding: Hardcover
• Illustrator: Brown Marc
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 32