Customer Reviews

Amelia's Guide to Babysitting (Amelia's Notebook)

5 star:		(12)
4 star:		(8)
3 star:		(3)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

Amelia, our favorite middle school student, explores babysitting. She gives a lot of practical advice and information. She also shares some stories of babysitting experiences. Amelia and her friend Carly decide to give babysitting a try. They find that babysitting is harder than it looks. Then they remember what they used to do with their own babysitters!

This book would be good to buy for anyone considering babysitting. Teens and pre-teens will love the eye catching format. It has cute illustrations in a notebook like format.

Like the other Amelia books, you will love this true life experience in the world of babysitting.

Teachers and Media Specialists, this book is a must for your classroom or school library. Students in grades 4-8 won't be able to put it down.

It somewhat pains me to give this book 5 stars. I must do so, since my child has read this book 5 times through since it came last week, so obviously it has enormous appeal for the target age group. When I asked the reason for the appeal, I heard, " I just love all the Amelia books, with the quizzes and the charts, and this one had a funny ending."

Having read the book, though, I am not overly impressed. There is very little plot, little character development, and it wasn't even very funny. She spends the entire book worrying about babysitting and characterizing different kinds of children and babysitters. Yawn. When she finally gets a job that presents some challenges it's a welcome relief from her pointless fretting and a delight to finally have something happen. It's also a signal that the book is about to end, which was, for me, also a relief.

This book is listed as for 10-13 year olds, but I think it very likely that elementary-school-aged children will read this one. Not only is the design appealing to younger children, but it is a continuation of a series that begins with an elementary-aged Amelia.

Given the possible younger readership, I would caution parents about two passages in this book. In one, a girl describes her embarrassment when the parents came home while she was with a boyfriend, and there is a drawing of a girl and boy kissing. In another, there is a mention of thong underwear. These may not be topics all parents feel comfortable having their eight-year-olds read about.

I'd give this two stars. My child gives it five, though, so I'll defer to the judgment of the targeted age group.

AMELIA'S GUIDE TO BABYSITTING by Marissa Moss is the latest in the series of children's books that began with AMELIA'S NOTEBOOK.

Like the rest of the series, this "guide" looks very much like a 6th grade girl's notebook. Evenly spaced, blue, horizontal lines show through colorful, child-like doodles that illustrate the humorous, handwritten text. Even the copyright page is handwritten and includes notes like "with help from Lucy Ruth Cummins. She even changed a soggy diaper!"

The story, too, seems to have a real 6th grade girl's voice: completely honest, sweet and often funny. Amelia comes off the page as if she were a real person--and that is what makes the Amelia series such a delight. Most girls this age can identify with Amelia or would find her to be a girl they'd like to have as a friend.

In this book, Amelia and her best friend Carly decide to work as a babysitting team. To guide them, Amelia creates a series of quizzes, charts and scales on topics like "What Kind of Babysitter Are You?" "What Matters Most When You're Babysitting?" and the "Extra Chores Tolerance Scale."

Girls who like magazine personality quizzes will enjoy these. However, they do mean that most of the action takes place in the second half of the book. The slow start might be a turn-off to some readers, but fans of the series probably won't mind.

This book presents babysitting in a realistic light--complete with soggy diapers, little kids who won't stop screaming, and parents who call every five minutes. Babysitting is presented as rewarding, but not the "getting-paid-to-watch-TV" job some kids think it is. The honesty, however, might be a bit too much for some parents, particularly when Amelia's sister Cleo explains how she lost a babysitting job because she invited her boyfriend to the house.

I enjoyed the first book in the series more, but would still recommend this book for any young girl who is considering babysitting for the first time and for all fans of the Amelia's Notebook series.

While I'm the freelance writer in the family, my daughter is the avid reader of books for the middle school set, so I let her have first crack at Amelia's Guide to Babysitting by Marissa Moss. She gave it 4.5 stars saying:

"It has 30% good, helpful babysitting info and the rest is just pure fun! It's not really a 'how-to' babysit, but more what it's like with lots of funny tips. I really liked the quizzes and the descriptions of babies and toddlers. The stories were good too, and it was fun to read."

My daughter is 10 and reads at college level books, but loves a good, fun, quick read that's geared towards her age group. This one seems to hit the mark. She said it reminded her of Diary of a Wimpy Kid. This was the first time she's read "Amelia" and she said she'd like to read others by Marissa Moss in the series, but says it's 'girly' and that boys wouldn't like it. Did I mention she's a tomboy?

Note that while it is recommended for 10 to 13 year olds, it would be best for 9 to 11 according to my daughter. Since it's not really a 'how-to' babysit and more about what it's like for the girls in the book to do it.

From an adult's perspective (that would be me...) this book isn't like 50 Best Babysitting Tips (American Girl Backpack Books) which is a helpful guide, but it's fun and a quick, enjoyable read for pre-teens. The cartoons and stories are simple, and illustrate to budding babysitters what they can expect to encounter when they start their own adventures in babysitting. A definite 'primer', but perhaps not quite a 'guide'.

Great book for 10-12 year olds! Amelia and her best friend Carly decide to start a baby-sitting business together. Written in notebook form and full of great illustrations, Amelia shares their baby-sitting adventures and tips for new baby sitters.

The book is written to be a lot of fun for kids who want to babysit. It's full of quizzes to help kids figure out how to be a good babysitter. My daughter would have loved this when she was the right age!

A funny book about Amelia and her friend's adventures babysitting. The book is colorful and quirky, contains lots of "sidebars", lists, and notes about babysitting, kids, parents, and so forth.

Amelia and her friend start a business babysitting, realize it is harder than they expected, but they adapt, make more lists, and move on.

If you are looking for a real guide to babysitting, this is not your book. But for an amusing look into the lives of new babysitters, this is worth a quick read.

Readers of the other Amelia books will want to snap this one up. In her usual honest, funny way, Amelia shares her first babysitting experiences.

She and her best friend Carly are partners in their new sitter service, the Double Bees. Cleo, Amelia's obnoxious older sister helps them get their first job, and not-so-secretly, hopes they will fail.

Amelia writes quizzes in her notebook as she prepares for the big day. The first couple of jobs are easy, but the third, well, let's just say that it's very funny : ).

For Amelia fans everywhere, it's a no-brainer. Get it. Read it. You'll love it.

My daughter adores the Amelia books written my Marissa Moss. With amusing colorful pictures, the stories and humorous side notes and drawings, Amelia's Guide to Babysitting provides tweens and teens a sometimes honest, a sometimes hilarious insight to babysitting. I found the section on "Types of Babies" and "Types of Toddlers" to be amusingly accurate!

Unlike a lot of graphic novels aimed at kids who don't really like to read, Amelia's Guide to Babysitting stuffs a lot of content into its pages. Telling the story of Amelia and her friend and their attempt to open a babysitting business, the story definitely is aimed at younger teens or even preteens. Meaning, there are lots of references to snacks and diapers.

There also are a lot of witty touches on each page that kept me, an adult mother, interested enough to keep reading. But to me, the real proof that this book has a great audience is that my 10-year-old son more or less stole the book from my bedside table in order to read it over breakfast and in the car going to school. He was slightly ashamed to be reading a girls' book, but he thought it had a funny approach to describing little kids and a real Captain Underpants sort of humor to it.

It's not going to win a Nobel prize, but this is a book that is suitable for all kinds of young readers thanks to its wit and kid-friendly approach.

I bought this book for my daughter. She's read all of the Amelia series, so she was excited to read this one. My daughter is about Amelia's age, so the books in this series are relevant. In addition, the "diary" format is fun to read, as the text looks like writing, and there are doodles, pictures, and sketches thrown in as well. My daughter loved it as much as the others, especially as she is so interested to begin babysitting! Great series for the pre-teen set.