MY FIRST LOOK AT COLORS

Photographs explore the concept of color, from red cherries and yellow duck to blue marbles and other colorful objects

PreSchool-- Four attractively designed concept books with vivid full-color photographs organized neatly against white backgrounds. There is a good mix of familiar and unfamiliar labeled objects, and the concepts increase in complexity within each book. In Colors , children progress from primary colors to a page of black and one of white items. Red objects range from a car to a boxing glove with some attempt to illustrate many different shades. Numbers is organized with a bold number on the top of the page, a reference to the items shown ("3 three flowers"), and a progression from 10 to 20 and 100 at the end. Shapes covers the familiar as well as the complex: circles, triangles, squares, rectangles, diamonds, stars, rings, ovals, and hearts. Beans, eggs, and pebbles will encourage children to find similar oval-shaped objects in their environment. Sizes covers the different aspects of dimension (big, little; little to big; big, bigger, biggest; same size; growing). An inviting series that should entertain as well as encourage observation. --Pearl Herscovitch, University of Calgary, Alberta, Canada
Copyright 1990 Reed Business Information, Inc.

These four titles in the My First Look At series contain crisp, imaginatively chosen images in bold, vibrant colors. Shapes includes cookies, a sea urchin and green marbles in its spread that introduces circles. In Numbers , photographs of brightly patterned gloves (some are puppet mittens) set off the number nine, while 100 nonpareil candies fill a mouthwatering spread. Taking the concepts one step further, Numbers and Sizes end with a provocative twist--the former depicts groups of already presented objects and asks, "How many?"; and Sizes introduces "Growing. Our hands get bigger as we grow." The caption accompanies photos of four hands ranging from pudgy baby to hairy man. Chock full of child-accessible items that nearly bound off the pages, these books are an entertaining, worthwhile addition to the plethora of offerings in this genre. Ages 1-5.
Copyright 1990 Reed Business Information, Inc.