Customer Reviews

Picking Apples & Pumpkins (Read with Me Paperbacks)

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

 

 

Picking Apples & Pumpkins is an angaging, informative and beautifully photographed book for kids and parents. Set on a glowing, autumnal New Jersey farm, the book follows a family as they pick apples, have a picknick, select pumpkins, bake a pie and carve jack-o-laterns. Because the story is logically laid out, it has yet to tire our kids; there's so much to learn from the photographs of real people in a real orchard and a real pumpkin patch tended by a real farmer. I can't stess enough the fact that the book's appeal derives from its use of photographs rather than the fancified and grotesque illustrations that seem so popular these days. I hope this book leads to a series of similar efforts.

Sid Fortune, Minneapolis, MN

This is a very simple book about a caucasion family consisting of a daughter and mother and father who goes on an outing to pick apples and pumpkins in the fall. After the family picks out their pumpkin and apples they go home to make a jack-o-lantern. In the end the girl goes trick or treating with other children. Trick or treaters are dressed as a witch, devil, pirate, ghost, queen, and a monster.

The illustrations are softly done in muted colors of autumn tones. The text is very simple and short, perhaps this would be suitable for beginning readers as well...

This book is a great book to use with a unit on fall. You can teach the 1st part of the book in the 1st two weeks of a 4 week unit and then teach the 2nd part of the book for the last two weeks of the unit. I have used this book to teach about apples and pumpkins to a two year old class and I will using it again to teach a 4 year old class. Be creative. The children can learn the names of the characters. You can have a picnic lunch in your classroom, just like the characters in the book, do.

You can make applesauce, learn the difference between colors of apples. Have an "apple toss" game or go on a apple hunt, make jack o lanterns. It's a great book to use for fall that doesn't use pumpkins strictly for halloween.

I'm confused by the July 17th 2002 review (Christinemm). There are no Trick or Treaters in our book, just pictures of a family and young friends on an outing to the orchard where they pick apples and pumpkins and have a picnic. After arriving home, the children bake a pie with Grandma's help and make jack-o-lanterns with dad. [There is another book with a similar title, perhaps Amazon has accidentally confused the two.]

In any case... the pictures are very nice and as another reviewer noted, much better than any drawings could be.

That said, if you are purchasing this book as any sort of `Reader', you should know that the text is not suitable for any but experienced readers (imho). Despite the "Read with Me" label on the cover, the average page in this book has 50 or more words on it. In addition, the text contains words like: old-fashioned, Battleview, pretended, collapsed, and caramel. Hardly suitable for younger students. A paragraph (as it appears in the book) follows so you can determine the level for yourself.

This time, Scott's hay

wagon brought everyone

to the farm store. While

Kristy's mother paid for

the apples and pumpkins,

Kristy and her friends

looked around. They were

amazed by all the delicious

things that could be made

from apples. There were

caramel apples, candy

apples, apple jam, apple

cake, and apple butter.

There were pumpkin pies

and breads, too. But Kristy

knew that when they got

home, Grandma would

make the best treat of all-

apple pie!

Three Stars. The pictures are nice and more interesting than drawings. They elicit the warm glow of autumn days and bring a sense of fun as the children romp and climb trees. It is nice that not everyone is white, and that people of all ages are shown. Despite the "Read With Me" label, you won't find a `Reader' here for young children. The only real down note that I have, is that despite the enthusiasm expressed by others, my children (boy and girl; almost 4 and 6) were not particularly interested in this book.

It may have been written, but I did not realize this book would not include both English and Spanish text (as the title does). The text of the book is in Spanish only. The photos are very nice.

I have read this book many times to all of my Grandchildren. They love it! The photography is wonderful as well as the story. I think it is something that children relate to well and the "fun" of a family outing in the fall has an enchantment for all young readers as well as smaller children that do not read yet. Fall presents such a warm glow of color and the onset of holidays..........it is a magical time of year filled with fun,tantilizing aromas from recently harvested fruits and excitement in anticipation of carving pumpkins for Halloween. This book definately gets a five star rating from me!