My Truck Book (Smithsonian) (Board book)

~ Ellen Kirk (Author)

Editorial Reviews

Product Description

Exceptional nonfiction for children from one of the most trusted names in learning: the Smithsonian Institution.

Product Details

• Reading level: Baby-Preschool
  
• Board book: 16 pages
• Publisher: Collins (October 10, 2006)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0060899425
• ISBN-13: 978-0060899424
• Product Dimensions: 7 x 6.8 x 0.4 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.6 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 3.5 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (2 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #1,292,375 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars fun board book for youngsters about trucks of many kinds, February 20, 2007

By	Karyn W "blckwidow8" (Kansas City, MO United States) - See all my reviews

This is a short and simple truck book with good photos and some descriptions of each truck that my two year old really enjoys. There seven trucks with some descriptions and somewhat engaging questions to ask your toddlers and preschoolers. This will help answer (just a few of)the questions of your inquisitive little ones.

3.0 out of 5 stars Board book for older children, October 15, 2009

By	Experienced Editor (Illinois, United States) - See all my reviews

Board books from the Smithsonian Institution? It's an appealing idea: simple fact books for toddlers. My Truck Book (along with its companion My Plane Book) leads a convoy of a proposed 24-book series produced jointly by Smithsonian and Collins, an imprint of HarperCollins Publishers.
The text follows a simple pattern: on each left-hand page, two sentences name a task and ask what kind of truck can do the job. The answer appears on the right-hand page. Surprisingly, almost every page uses passive voice: "A new sidewalk is being built." "A big hole needs to be filled with dirt." It's an unusual choice for a board book, but one giving toddlers early exposure to a fairly advanced grammatical construction.
Each two-page spread contains a single, large, clear photo of a different kind of truck with two, three, or four elements labeled. The tractor-trailer rig identifies simply tractor and trailer. For the cement mixer truck, arrows point to concrete chute, mixer barrel, and driver's cab. Features labeled on other pages include headlight, wheel, grill, mud flap, windshield, tailgate, and more. Young children will quickly learn these terms and delight in shouting them out when they see the real thing on real trucks.
Each truck is placed on a colored background with no landscape to distract from the details of the vehicle itself. The photos provide visual challenges that kids will slowly figure out as they return to the pages again and again over time. On the tanker truck, for example, the arrow labeling "mirror" points to the rearview mirror on the cab, although the cab itself is hidden by the tank. The tank is shiny, clean, highly polished metal with a flat end in back reflecting a highway scene that is not shown on the page. Toddlers may at first see the end of the tanker as the "mirror" but will learn to differentiate by studying the picture and looking at real trucks in their world.
The perspective, too, is more advanced than is usual in a board book. Again, this gives young children an incentive to compare the pictures with real trucks. On the fire truck, labels point to turntable, ladder, water gun, and hoses. The hoses are folded neatly and are flat, as fire hoses are when not in use; kids may initially be confused and will need to relate this to the extended hoses they see elsewhere. The turntable at the back of the truck is partly obscured by the camera angle and again will make sense only after a child can see and walk around a real truck with a turntable. Reading the book with a young child may well prompt a family field trip to a fire station.
My Truck Book is the first of a series that promises to challenge young children and keep them coming back to ponder the pictures on the pages. With a proposed two dozen titles forthcoming, parents should be able to find a book to suit every child's personal interest.