Dig Dig Digging [Board book]

Margaret Mayo (Author), Alex Ayliffe (Illustrator)

Book Description

Age Level: 3 and up

A perfect book for little digger-lovers!

 

Trucks and tractors, fire engines and helicopters--they all like to work hard. But after a long, happy day of beep-beeping and vroom-vrooming, even the busiest engines need to rest. This bright, bouncy, noise-filled book brings together all the vehicles that children adore.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

Cataloguing the world of heavy equipment, this vibrant square volume explores the unique capabilities of 11 vehicles, from construction trucks to rescue helicopters. On each spread, Mayo (Wiggle Waggle Fun) offers plenty of colorful adjectives and terse verbs: "Bulldozers are good at push, push, pushing, over rough, bumpy ground, scraping, and shoving." Ayliffe, who explored some of this territory before in The Busy Building Book, pictures two bulldozers, one yellow and the other red, attacking clods of dirt and showing trees no mercy as they maneuver around a hill at precarious angles. The artist works in brightly colored cut paper, adding just enough detail to the people and landscapes (the bumpy texture of caterpillar tracks, the grid work of a crane tower) to satisfy young enthusiasts. A refrain on each spread reminds readers that these distinctive vehicles share at least one similarity: "They can work all day." A final spread of a darkened town full of stilled vehicles demonstrates that even giant trucks and earthmovers need to turn off their engines: "Shhh! They can rest all night." Ages 3-5.
Copyright 2002 Cahners Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to the Hardcover edition.

From School Library Journal

reSchool-K-Bold, bright spreads present visual word poems about large trucks, tractors, and cranes and the work they do. Often the shape of the rhyme reflects the action performed by the machine. For example, the bold, black print describing fire engines arcs and curves like the water splashing from the fireman's hose. Text about the bulldozer bumps across the page. "Bulldozers are good at push, push, pushing, over rough, bumpy ground, scraping and shoving." The verse on every page ends with the refrain, "They can work all day." Although not all of the rhymes are equally satisfying, they successfully move readers from page to page, truck to truck. The large, simple images in vivid colors and wide, uncluttered spreads will appeal to young children. Stylized skyscrapers dot the horizon in contrasting colors of purple and pink or blue and white, against very blue, sunny skies. The people are all Lego-like in appearance. The last spread, at the end of a very busy book, quiets its colors, with motors off and machines at rest. This book will rev the engines of those youngsters who love vehicles.
Alice Casey Smith, Sayreville Public Schools, Parlin, NJ
Copyright 2002 Cahners Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to the Hardcover edition.

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Reading level: Ages 3 and up
  
• Board book: 24 pages
• Publisher: Henry Holt and Co. BYR Paperbacks; 1st edition (August 8, 2006)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0805079858
• ISBN-13: 978-0805079852
• Product Dimensions: 5.8 x 6 x 0.5 inches
• Shipping Weight: 7.2 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.6 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (28 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #122,451 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
  • #16 in Books > 4-for-3 Books > Children's Books > Science, Nature & How It Works > Heavy Machinery
  • #23 in Books > Children's Books > Science, Nature & How It Works > Heavy Machinery

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

8 of 8 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A winner with any machine-obsessed toddler, July 7, 2002

By 

Julia Flyte - See all my reviews
(TOP 500 REVIEWER)    (VINE VOICE)   

This review is from: Dig Dig Digging (Hardcover)

My two year old son adores this book and it's a lot of fun reading it aloud to him. Each page describes a piece of equipment - eg diggers, helicopters, rubbish trucks, cranes, bulldozers - and how hard they are working ALL DAY LONG. The language is really descriptive and captures the noises that the machines make. The words on each page have been laid out to reinforce the job that the machines do too. The illustrations are bright and appealing. This book is a definite winner with any child who likes noisy machines (and what toddler doesn't?!).

7 of 7 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Re-readable, May 3, 2004

By 

Andy (Australia) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Dig, Dig, Digging (On the Go) (Paperback)

I've a 2.5 year old son who is fascinated by machines and wheels.

I am not, and find most of his favourite books on these subjects rather tiresome.

However, this book is fun: its catchy rhyme and rhythm, and its quirky but somehow interesting and realistic pictures entertain me as well as him. He revels in the masculine, repetitive onomatopoeias which are fun to read out loud.

6 of 7 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Good, but..., April 18, 2005

By 

K. A. Kelley "kkelley69" - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Dig Dig Digging (Hardcover)

My two year-old loves the book and loves the pictures, but I felt like it didn't always make sense and could have been written better. Sometimes the authors force the text to fit the form they have set up. The Tracker goes "squelch sqelch"?? But, the pictures are good and my son LOVES it. I just wish I was happier reading it.