Customer Reviews

Amelia's Show-and-Tell Fiesta / Amelia y la fiesta de muestra y cuenta (Spanish and English Edition)

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Genre & Age
Realistic stories. Young elementary picture book.

Summary
A Cuban immigrant girl is excited about her new school in the US. When Amelia wears a dress for show and tell, she is embarrassed because she didn't understand the concept of show and tell. She is in a class of students from around the world. The book is written in English and Spanish. The teacher helps Amelia solve the problem.

Illustrations
Beautiful and colorful illustrations.

Amelia is excited the first day in her new American classroom, with friends to meet and a teacher who announces that tomorrow is Show and Tell. All the way home, Amelia tries to decide what will be appropriate for the assignment and finally she settles on her fiesta dress with its three fancy skirts: "First rojo whips around her hips like red hot peppers; Amarillo swirls about her knees like a sea of yellow corn; Blanco circles her feet like a flock of white doves." Dressed the next morning in her fiesta finery, Amelia cannot wait to show her class the dress; but when she enters the classroom, no one is dressed up. The students all look the same as yesterday and here is Amelia, so different from everyone else.

When another little girl asks what Amelia has brought for Show and Tell, she points to a large basket on the teacher's desk filled with treasures: a clay elephant from India, a handmade truck and a carp-shaped kite. Called upon to share, Amelia has nothing to say, embarrassed; but suddenly "her twirling skirts spring to life in a samba, a tango, a rumba" as Amelia gleefully describes how people love fiestas on her island home, enjoying hours of dancing in the streets. The children clap in approval and Amelia is no longer an outsider, part of the wonderful new world of her classroom.

Besides the helpful bilingual format, this book is especially sensitive to a child's fear of otherness in a strange situation, resolving the potential conflict in a positive manner by embracing and celebrating differences. The brilliant illustrations that accompany the text bring Amelia to life, her dark curly hair, sparkling eyes, her happiness, then confusion, her three-layered dress and the dancing skirts that help her remember her proud origins to share with her classmates. Uplifting and positive, this is a lovely story for youngsters exploring their own differences and the value of nonconformity. Luan Gaines/ 2006.

My first grade granddaugther is studying Spanish as part of her school curriculum. We found this book at the library this summer and she LOVED it! We're now buying it for her first grade classroom's library. The kids really like having the English/Spanish translations on each page (that's also easier for the reader), and the story line is both fun and hits close to home as school starts and there are "new kids" in the classroom who weren't there last year.