Customer Reviews

Simon's Hook; A Story About Teases and Put-downs

5 star:		(33)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

Simon's Hook - A Story About Teases and Put-Downs is a great book for any child. BUT it is also a teaching tool with a highly original story and wonderful images. Children learn several ways to deal with teasing - from ignoring the teaser to changing the subject to avoiding situations, etc. (We don't want to give away the whole story). And the story is so good that children will pick it up again-and-again just to read - yet we know they are learning how to cope with teasing at the same time! Simon's Hook is a great addition to any family, school or library. From The Science Spiders Newsletter.

When Simon is teased by his friends, Grandma rose compares teasing to fishing hooks and shows Simon how he doesn't have to get caught up in the mean game his friends are playing. Simon's Hook is an excellent way to teach children to be more resilient.
The cover (not yet shown today) has a red background and Simon is sitting on a hook under water as if it was a swing. Fish swim about and all the characters are fanciful and smiling.

The basic story includes a "bad hair day." When Simon's sister can't find her gum, she finds that it is in Simon's hair. Unfortunately she has to cut off a lot of his hair to get the gum out. This story will be very familiar to children. I remember this happening to me when I fell asleep while chewing gum.

Simon is doing quite well while wearing a hat, but when he falls and his hat falls off, all the children start to call him lawn mower head. As he runs home he accidentally runs into Grandma Rose. Simon tells her what happened and tells her about the teasing.

"But why do you bite? "
"Bite?" cried Simon.
"I didn't bite anyone!"

After going into her garage, Grandma Rose returns with a fishing line. A piece of paper is attached to the end of the hook and a cat is trying to bat at the paper. By waving the paper around for the cat, Grandma Rose shows how the cat bats at the paper. Then, she dangles the paper in front of Simon. Then Simon catches the paper too.

"You're not a free fish anymore."
"But what else can I do?"

Then over a glass of lemonade and a few cookies, Grandma Rose tells Simon a fish story. The next two pages are filled with fish thinking, saying things or biting at pieces of paper with put downs and teases written on them.

I had to laugh because some of the fish are quite adorable (the "peace" fish named Harmony Hippy Fish is a hoot) and the entire story is rather cute. At the end of the book all the fish are drawn in one picture and their names are listed next to them. The shark is of course called: "tiny." They also have some witty comments that one could consider to be a snappy retort. At the bottom of the ocean we see an Instead of Biting do this sign. It lists five ways to avoid getting caught by teasing.

There are pages and pages of fishes saying various things that are quite amusing. Even I was laughing out loud at a few of the fish stories.

When Simon returns to the park he has a new attitude and his friends enjoy his new witty remarks. He no longer takes them seriously and can enjoy the attention.

Karen Gredig Burnett writes highly creative books and Laurie Barrows knows how to draw the characters Karen is talking about. So, together they create a magic all of their own.

If your child is struggling with teasing, this book will empower them and show them that they can laugh at difficulty and embrace change. I might even start using a few of the witty comments in this book when my husband teases me. This book is definitely not just for younger kids. It can also empower adults and teenagers.

Also look for:

Katie's Rose
If the World were Blind
The Magical, Marvelous Megan G. Beamer

~The Rebecca Review

This is a great book that empowers kids to deal with children who tease them. So often adults tell children to walk away...that is a difficult thing to do...especially for children who are learning so many life skills. "that's not fair they said that", "They are so mean". So often the kids want to tell on them to get them in trouble...to find justice in the "wrong" behavior. This focuses on what the child can control and not what they can't control.

This book has helped my daughter a lot! She is a child who gets her feelings hurt quite a bit. This has helped empower her and, overall, made many of the teasing children stop teasing her.

I highly recommend it!

I use this book every year to start out the school year. I teach fifth grade, but the kids need these skills so much by the time they get to fifth grade. I made a poster using the strategies presented in this book and post it in my room all year. I remind my kids frequently of what Simon says we need to do. It helps. GREAT BOOK!

My five-year-old is having a bit of difficulty with two children at his daycare. I have purchased several adult books on how to help a child deal with bullies/teasing, but hadn't been successful in finding a good children's book. Then I found "Simon's Hook". Through funny pictures and dialogue, the book has given my son five sensible practical approaches on how to deal with difficult peers. I highly recommend this book.

Simon's Hook is a fantastic tool to help teach us skills for dealing with verbal bullying. These are life long skills every person would benefit from having. We use it in an anti-bullying campaign designed for K-8. There are other books as well but this is the key to setting up the language the entire staff and student body will use and understand. It is used not only in our local public school system but in a number of private schools nearby. I was first introduced to the book through a special education program for children with social skills deficits such as Aspergers and higher functioning levels of autism who tend to be more gullible and clearly more tempting as targets. For these kids just knowing one or two ways to deflect the taunts and teasing has made a huge difference. Imagine the benefits gained by children (and adults) who have "normal" social skills awareness. While this is an excellent book in my opinion of giving a set of concrete skills to handle being bullied it falls short in the department of teaching how to not be a bully in the first place. It can be used for that purpose by asking when has the person been the one setting out the bait and how do they like being the one who gets hooked, etc.

This is a wonderful, and much needed, book. Most books about teasing and bullying are aimed at the bullies themselves, and if they address the victims at all it is to simply say "Just ignore it." But finally, thanks to Karen Gedig Burnett, there is this wonderful book that not only addresses the victims of teasing, but enpowers them by giving them real, concrete ways to respond to, and stop, teasing and put downs. This is a WONDERFUL book, that should be in every school library, every classroom, and in the home of every child who has been teased and wondered how to get the teasing to stop. Thank you Ms. Burnett. You have done a real service for the children who read this book, and for their parents.

I loved this book, and bought it immediately after it was recommended at a
parenting workshop. My 6-year-old daughter asked for it to be read to her over
and over and quickly caught on to the techniques. She took it to school,
and her teacher read it to all the kids (interestingly, her friend who
bullies her, didn't seem to like the book that much!!!) It helped me -
my older sisters used to tease me endlessly, and my husband can still bring
me to tears with his teasing. The book actually teaches you techniques so
you can feel powerFUL, not powerLESS, when teased or put down.

It doesn't really try to explain why other kids tease or bully, or lament
that they do. It just deals with the only thing you can really control,
your own reactions to it.

Yes, adults, too. There are some pretty mean adults around, and you can use these same technics!! This book writes it in a way that kids will get it, that they shouldn't react to teases and put-downs. Excellent book. A+

This was a very good book. It was filled with lots of ideas for dealing with teases and put downs. There is a lot of little details in the drawings, makes it a fun read. My daughters noticed something new everytime we read it. Thank you, Grandma Rose.