Likely to be a friend to STEM elementary educators.
STEM content on simple machines and robotics meets play and compassion.
A diverse group of children with varying skin tones and hair textures works with a robot to build a treehouse. A black girl emerges as the leader of the group, and it’s her friend Robot who assists them. Robot lends a fantastic feel to the story, since illustrations make it look like something out of The Jetsons rather than a robot like those described in backmatter, but the things it introduces (a wedge, a wagon with wheels, screws, a hammer, a ladder, and a pulley) are immediately relevant and accessible to child readers learning about simple machines and other tools. Singsong text (set to the tune of “London Bridge” in the backmatter and on an accompanying CD, performed by Norma Joan Wright) shifts from the pragmatic to the emotional when, after resourceful Robot helps build the treehouse, it is stumped as to how to help a fretful dog get up to it. The children use emotional intelligence and say “Pet him in a gentle way, gentle way—it’s been a long day” and successfully sooth the dog so it can join them in the treehouse as Robot departs. Throughout, illustrations highlight the key tools and steps in the building process, and the backmatter provides more comprehensive information about their functions.
Likely to be a friend to STEM elementary educators. (Picture book. 5-7)Pub Date: Oct. 1, 2017
ISBN: 978-1-78285-322-0
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Barefoot Books
Review Posted Online: July 16, 2017
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 1, 2017
A retro-futuristic romp, literally and figuratively screwy.
Robo-parents Diode and Lugnut present daughter Cathode with a new little brother—who requires, unfortunately, some assembly.
Arriving in pieces from some mechanistic version of Ikea, little Flange turns out to be a cute but complicated tyke who immediately falls apart…and then rockets uncontrollably about the room after an overconfident uncle tinkers with his basic design. As a squad of helpline techies and bevies of neighbors bearing sludge cake and like treats roll in, the cluttered and increasingly crowded scene deteriorates into madcap chaos—until at last Cath, with help from Roomba-like robodog Sprocket, stages an intervention by whisking the hapless new arrival off to a backyard workshop for a proper assembly and software update. “You’re such a good big sister!” warbles her frazzled mom. Wiesner’s robots display his characteristic clean lines and even hues but endearingly look like vaguely anthropomorphic piles of random jet-engine parts and old vacuum cleaners loosely connected by joints of armored cable. They roll hither and thither through neatly squared-off panels and pages in infectiously comical dismay. Even the end’s domestic tranquility lasts only until Cathode spots the little box buried in the bigger one’s packing material: “TWINS!” (This book was reviewed digitally with 9-by-22-inch double-page spreads viewed at 52% of actual size.)
A retro-futuristic romp, literally and figuratively screwy. (Picture book. 5-7)Pub Date: Sept. 1, 2020
ISBN: 978-0-544-98731-9
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Clarion Books
Review Posted Online: June 2, 2020
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 15, 2020
Emergent readers will like the humor in little Pip’s pointed requests, and more engaging adventures for Otto and Pip will be...
In his third beginning reader about Otto the robot, Milgrim (See Otto, 2002, etc.) introduces another new friend for Otto, a little mouse named Pip.
The simple plot involves a large balloon that Otto kindly shares with Pip after the mouse has a rather funny pointing attack. (Pip seems to be in that I-point-and-I-want-it phase common with one-year-olds.) The big purple balloon is large enough to carry Pip up and away over the clouds, until Pip runs into Zee the bee. (“Oops, there goes Pip.”) Otto flies a plane up to rescue Pip (“Hurry, Otto, Hurry”), but they crash (and splash) in front of some hippos with another big balloon, and the story ends as it begins, with a droll “See Pip point.” Milgrim again succeeds in the difficult challenge of creating a real, funny story with just a few simple words. His illustrations utilize lots of motion and basic geometric shapes with heavy black outlines, all against pastel backgrounds with text set in an extra-large typeface.
Emergent readers will like the humor in little Pip’s pointed requests, and more engaging adventures for Otto and Pip will be welcome additions to the limited selection of funny stories for children just beginning to read. (Easy reader. 5-7)Pub Date: March 1, 2003
ISBN: 0-689-85116-2
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Atheneum
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 1, 2003
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