Customer Reviews

Big Words for Little People

5 star:		(61)
4 star:		(13)
3 star:		(3)
2 star:		(3)
1 star:		(4)

 

 

I bought this for my neice yesterday because she has two other books by Jamie and they are favourites of hers, so this was an obvious choice. It already seems like a winner.
While teaching 'big words' to little people, she is also teaching mini lessons. For example, when she teaches the word Consequence, she says to them - "When you're at school and you get in trouble, for chewing your gum, and exploding a bubble, and you stay inside when your friends get to play, your consequence is no recess that day". And there is story about when shopping, if people get irrate, then you should cooperate. So it's a book that helps children understand these big words that we use with them.
As usual, the illustrations are fantastic and colorful and fun, and the words and lessons are great for them and there is so much to learn in here. I especially love when they talk about the most important word Love at the end of the book. "Love is the biggest big word of all, four little letters that help you walk tall, love is your family, your siblings, your friends, love is your ocean without any end". Jamie is a great 'teacher' for kids. She has a great way with words and making learning fun. This book is fantastic and really enjoyable for kids (and adults reading it to the kids). I highly recommend this and am sure everyone will have hours of fun reading and re-reading it again and again.

Do you want to be in a good mood when you read to your tykesters and tykestresses? Buy this book! It's chicken soup for the reader's soul.

Can you remember when you were little and liked to play with words, almost like putting together alphabet blocks in the air to amaze people? Jamie Lee Curtis and Laura Cornell evoke that wondrous moment in childhood and provide parents, grandparents, aunts, and uncles with a resource to prepare the younger set to share some stunning pronouncements that will amaze casual observers.

Characterizing the book that way isn't really accurate. There are wheels within wheels here; orbs that will charm those who are looking for other sorts of entertainment. Here's an example: In our family, all the wee ones loved searching for tiny hidden items in puzzle books. Big Words for Little People has tiny drawings and labels throughout that invite and reward minute inquiry. For instance, the two-page spread on "consequence" contains a note that a frog and six little ones are missing from the terrarium. Tiny dots of green reveal bits and pieces of the escapees in humorous spots.

Adults like little surprises, too. Tiny notes and signs provide much adult humor that can be shared with youngsters . . . or simply chuckled over by the reader (such as the "Glowy Teeth" toothpaste with bleach and antibiotics).

There's an important context here: The words, stories, and illustrations are intended to convey useful principles for having a large, loving family enjoy each others' company. We have a mom and dad, six rambunctious youngsters in all shapes and sizes, and various pets. The beauty-obsessed sister needs some privacy to put on her face goo. Frantic mom is struggling to head for school and can't find the car keys. A happy teacher is portrayed as praising good spelling with "stupendous!" and "superb!" After a mishap with chewing gum, one sister has to sit inside during recess: That's a "consequence." On a challenging shoe run, dad wants everyone to "cooperate." Moms will appreciate that the book teaches children not to wake up mom when she's sick: That would be "inconsiderate." And on the lessons go.

The illustrations are marvelous. Although quite sophisticated in composition, they seem almost like what a mischievous child would enjoy painting in water colors. The bright colors bring a sunny emotional tone to the book that well matches the simple, clear verses written by Ms. Curtis.

Ms. Curtis and Ms. Cornell are an amazing team for perking up your family. Bring them into all of your children's bedrooms.

I will start off by saying that I feel the book is for a little bit older kids, older than my five year old anyway. He just didn't seem too thrilled with the book's words so much (sorry Jamie Lee Curtis) as he has never played duck duck goose and has no clue what G-rated vs. PG-13 is. One of the last lines of the book is as follows: "And the next time a grown-up thinks you don't have sense, show them with Big Words your intelligence!" This just didn't fly with me. I don't want my child thinking grown-ups think that children don't have sense and that my child will have to prove himself by using a big word or proving that he's smart.
I love my children because they are my children no matter what their intelligence level is at the time.

But the artwork is THE BEST! Even I loved to look over the book's pictures and see what was there, most of it very amusing and clever. My son just stared at the pictures, looking at each and every individual section and wanted me to wait before I turned the page after finished reading.

If I could I would give the artwork more than five stars but the writing maybe just a 2 or 3 stars as the writing just didn't seem to flow sometimes. And the gross part about the green boogers being picked, just not needed. Sorry Jamie Lee Curtis but more than likely I will not be buying another of your books as there is much better material out there for my children.

But as for Laura Cornell, I will be doing a search online for more of her work.

This picture book about seven siblings learning big words is a quirky delight. By the time I was done I felt I knew the specific personalities of each family member inside out.

Here is a family that everyone will recognize. A preteen daughter who needs her privacy, loves pink, and dances through life. The next in line, a son obsessed with magic tricks, who loves to play with his baby sister's curls. An effervescent Asian girl, in love with "The Sound of Music." Twin toddlers who are picky eaters. An adopted African-American preschooler who can spell CAT. A brand-new baby girl. Add in an orange cat that steals the car keys, a miniature dog named Leo and a fat white duck, and you have a full house.

The subtle theme of the book is that everyone is different and has a unique personality, which makes life interesting. All kids will be able to relate.

If you keep looking, you'll notice dozens and dozens of humorous little details. I love the "Cut `n' Tape Lederhosen" that keep turning up throughout the book. My favorite part of the whole book is the inside back cover, which shows a collection of the family's photos hanging on a wall. The photos show the kids at various ages, growing up. Apparently the little Asian girl was adopted overseas; there is a picture of the oldest girl and boy on a plane with her, gently putting headphones on her baby ears. A funny photo shows the oldest girl holding one of the twins, and next to her the preschool Asian girl holds the other twin around the neck -- the baby's face is blue! Photos of the cat as a kitten and the dog as a teeny puppy (smaller than a leaf!) are next to a photo I puzzled over. Then I realized... it's an egg, on a hot water bottle! The pet duck, about to hatch, of course.

The writing is terrific, and the watercolor-over-pen-and-ink illustrations are expressive and amazingly detailed. Both kids and parents will love this one.

Similar in tone and detail are the Fancy Nancy books: Fancy Nancy's Favorite Fancy Words: From Accessories to Zany (Fancy Nancy), Fancy Nancy: Bonjour, Butterfly (Fancy Nancy), Fancy Nancy Loves! Loves!! Loves!!! (Fancy Nancy) and many more.

Let me preface by saying I don't really know the whole Jamie Lee Curtis collection that well... I read the one about adoption, which I thought was very nice, but I'm not as familiar with the recurring cast of characters that apparently grace the books pages as some readers may be.

So in terms of this book standing on it's own, I was eager to check it out because it's making such a huge splash and because I thought the concept -- Big Words for Little People -- is an outstanding one. The only "high frequency words" kids are encountering these days aren't simply the names of fruits and colors and school terms that come home on our school lists. Especially with character education gaining ground in schools and in the forefront of parents' minds, I think JLC is definitely on the right track with the words these kids may be hearing *all the time* but not really understanding fully, or even at all. Privacy, impossible, consequence, celebrate, cooperate, appropriate and inapppropriate, patience, understand, considerate/inconsiderate, responsible and different are the ones that really strike me as essential. We constantly ask kids to cooperate or to be considerate or to be patient, and they certainly pick up some sense of it through context and our reactions, but when do we ever really sit down and explain these words so they can truly understand our expectation.

In terms of execution, she loses a little ground. Overall it's pretty good and the explanations are clear. But in order to make the poetry work, the language can get pretty stilted -- enough that I'd say it cuts into the effect of making it easy for children to understand. It's more for poetic value and for the delight of the parents to have interesting phrasing tripping off the tongue. But for a book that is based on the very concept of understanding language, I'd say that doesn't quite line up. Also, in the fun of putting together the poetry, she does occasionally forget to truly explain the word -- blowing past it to keep the rhyme and meter going in an entertaining, more than explanatory way. Certainly it still provides a foundation for further discussion while reading, but oddly, I don't think kids will read the book with parents and understand the meanings of the words without further discussion.

The most lovely part of the book was the misty-eyed ending. Curtis takes the concept of "big words" and shifts it a little to mean "important words" and brings in family, respect and love (which she calls the "biggest word of all." Really a very touching and well-written message to end on.

So, as far as everything I've written so far, I was quite impressed. Still, in the end, I read and considered this book, but ultimately left it on the bookshelf. Here's why...

Ultimately, I wasn't crazy about the content message of the book overall. Most of the words in the book centered around managing kids' behavior. In some ways, that's exactly right, because expectations concerning their behavior is precisely what kids encounter all day long. But I felt this book took a really stereotypical approach to this concept -- and one I personally try to confound in dealings with kids. Most of the explanations centered around kids being "bad" or "good" -- they were being "impossible" to their mother, making a shopkeeper "irate" by talking loudly in a store, suffering a "consequence" for misbehaving in school (exploding chewing gum), being "inconsiderate" by being loud while mom was sleeping. On the other end being expected to "cooperate" being praised for desired behavior as "stupendous or superb." Also were the typical siblings are annoying references, including the "disgusting" younger brother. This kind of stuff just never feels right to me. I prefer to think of discipline in a less carrot/stick sort of way than what is delivered in this book, and in a subtle way, this just doesn't line up with the way we parent. And I don't believe younger kids are being disgusting by being age appropriate (I think it was picking his nose -- yes we ask them to stop, but all kids did it!). The "consequence" in the book was punitive, not logical -- keeping a kid out of recess for the exploding chewing gum. A logical consequence might have been cleaning the gum from the desks, even if it was during recess.

All of this really is quite subtle though... depending on how you parent, it might be fine. It's certainly not bad parenting messages -- just different enough from how I prefer to think about discipline that it doesn't feel authentic for my family and my kids.

Some of the descriptions were really perfect too -- waiting in a long line for "patience" and which movies are good for them for "appropriate and inappropriate" (it even recognizes that your mom may say something is inappropriate even though your friends may be allowed to do it!). The description of persevere is just lovely.

All in all, it's a really cute book, and a lovely gift. I chose to leave it on the shelf, but it was a close call. My family is a little uncommon in the way we think about discipline. If you are a no-time-outs and more attachment parenting/positive discipline family, I'd give it a read before you buy it to make sure it feels right to you.

....or anytime book for that matter. I admit this is the first "famous" celeb writer's book I've ever purchased and I will be buying the rest for sure. I loved this story. As soon as my 5 year old and I started reading it he began asking questions and wanting me to explain the words in relation to the family and his friends.

If Mrs. Curtis ever reads these reviews I would want her to know what a terrific thing she has done with these creations! To parents wondering if these celeb books are worth the money, well Jamie Lee Curtis' are! She's been doing these for many years and each one is definately written to make a child feel as special as they are. Thank you!!!!!

I will even be talking to my son's teacher to see if he can bring it in for in class reading day. Every child should be exposed to these big words as early as they can.

In order to ILLUSTRATE my point about this book.
I've decided to write in a SIMILAR manner. Look:
My daughter and I read a lot TOGETHER.
Perhaps this one RUSHED by the author to get her
quota of titles by the PUBULISHER required,
and so the writing is backwards and UNINSPIRED.
The art is not bad and the ILLUSTRATOR I commend,
but my big word for this book is not RECOMMEND.

This was the first book I have read by Jamie Lee Curtis, but it won't be the last. I am now interested.
My son (4) and I chose this book from the library and now we own it. It is one of his favorites and we read it at least once a week. My 8 month old loves the pictures and stays put while we read this one. It has a lyrical flow.
My main attractions to this book are of course, the words and the concepts it teaches. As a special education teacher, I am all about using a better vocabulary in everyday conversation, something my mother passed down to me. I use these words with my children and incorporate their meanings everyday. It is great to have a fun way to solidify those same values in a book.

I bought this book for my daughter's (she is a teacher) first grade class' book collection and got to read it to them the first time during a visit to the classroom as a guest reader. They loved the book. The timing could not have been better because one of their challenge words that week was "responsible". I had their full attention for the entire time; they enjoyed trying to sound out and guess the BIG WORDS. The book made them giggle, laugh, answer questions and participate in an interactive activity. What more could a reader of children's books ask for from a delightful book?

There are lots of bad children's books out there, but the fact that this one got published actually made me mad. As others have noted, the grammar and cadence are very sloppy, and the "big" words are not new words for any 4-8 year old (e.g., "understand"? really?). We have been given several of Jamie Lee Curtis' books but have been disappointed by all of them. They feature characters who are simultaneously dealing with learning to tie shoes and crushes on teachers. So, is it for a first grader or a sixth grader? Anyway, save your money. If you want a book that stretches vocabulary, try the Fancy Nancy series.