Albert's Field Trip - Hardcover

Tryon, Leslie

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0689318219 ISBN 13: 9780689318214

Publisher: Atheneum, 1993

Synopsis

Albert the duck leads his class on a field trip to Georgie and Gracie's Apple Farm, and they all enjoy songs on the bus, pick apples, and eat freshly baked pies. By the author of Albert's Alphabet.

About this title

From Publishers Weekly:

In his third appearance (following Albert's Alphabet and Albert's Play ), the quietly industrious goose Albert leads a menagerie of third graders on a field trip to an apple farm. The events are narrated in the prose of a young skunk named Gary, reporting on the trip for the school paper. Albert teaches them a special bus song about " 'the codling worm with the wiggle and the squirm.' . . . But the singing wasn't the best part," writes Gary, in a refrain that carries through apple picking, watching apples being processed into juice, then eating apple pies. Once again, Tryon's crisp watercolor and pencil drawings, composed in a variety of perspectives, make each scene one of discovery and remarkable depth. The pace, however, stumbles with a few double-page spreads that precede the text, compelling the reader to flip back to the illustration after reading its corresponding description. When the tired youngsters return to school at night, they're brought home and tucked into bed, and that, according to Gary, "was the best part." Whether the reader will feel such empathy or find the conclusion anticlimactic is open to debate. Certainly, Tryon captures the field trip experience in a gentle, low-key tone with striking visuals. Ages 5-8.
Copyright 1993 Reed Business Information, Inc.

From School Library Journal:

PreSchool-Grade 1-A goose named Albert leads a school trip to an apple farm in this pleasant book. Between the first page, showing the principal's note announcing the excursion, and the last, showing the thank-you note the class writes to their feline hostesses, the children experience everything one would expect on such a trip-singing on the bus, apple picking, and juice-making. Each page of text ends with the refrain, "...but that wasn't the best part." When the parents meet their sleepy children in the evening, take them home, and kiss them goodnight, readers learn that "...that was the best part." The story is told by one of the students in a distinctly childlike voice. Tryon's soft, watercolor/colored pencil illustrations are attractive and nicely composed, and often have an almost cinematic perspective. All of the characters are animals, realistically rather than cartoonishly rendered; as a result, they are somewhat expressionless. Both story and pictures are well done, but are not especially distinctive or outstanding.
Lauralyn Persson, Wilmette Public Library, IL
Copyright 1993 Reed Business Information, Inc.

About this edition

• Publisher: Atheneum
• Publication date: 1993
• ISBN 10: 0689318219
• ISBN 13: 9780689318214
• Binding: Hardcover
• Number of pages: 32
• Illustrator: Tryon Leslie