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Thursday, October 7, 2010

Library Day (A day late) Book Review: It's Time to Call 911

This week we are talking about fire safety and other emergencies so this week's book review is the book "It's Time to Call 911" published by Penton Overseas.


Review by Kamel622, originally posted on epinions.com
Overall Rating: Product Rating: 5.0
Pros: *Very educational
*Fun to read
*Hands on dialing
*Encouraging reward for dialing right

Cons: **

The Bottom Line: Young children need to learn how to properly use the 911 emergency service and this book will help them to practice and to learn.

With children having gone back to school my once very loud boisterous daycare is quiet and pretty calm. Right now I have just 4 year old Sonny and 2 year old Cindy. I’m enjoying the quiet, but of course I’m missing Jake and his sister Sammi very much. I recently purchased a book that I wish I would have had while they were here, but am enjoying sharing it with the two that I care for.

It’s Time to Call 911 is a great way for me to teach these two young children about how to use 911 and when it should be used. Since it is often just the three of us in the house, I do think that them being able to use this system could be a very good thing. You just never know what could happen so I want to be sure that at least 4 year old Sonny would be capable of making a call if it were ever needed.

I purchased this book at one of my favorite stores…we call it the teacher store since it is loaded with supplies, posters, books, teaching aids etc. I find it to be a tremendous bargain at $7.95 US or $12.95 CAN and plan to send it on to Mississippi as a part of the Literacy Write-Off hosted by Cindy and Stefanie

The bright red cover of this book is shaped like a telephone and has a red plastic telephone keypad on it. This keypad is visible at each of the pages, so that children can use it to practice dialing 911 as they read the book.

On the first page of the book we see green grass along the bottom half and sitting on the grass is a boy that looks to be crying and holding his arm up. The text next to him says I broke my arm! Below him written in deep red letters on the grass it says When something bad happens and you need help…It’s called an EMERGENCY! on the opposite page it asks Do you know what to do? and the telephone keypad is there to dial out the numbers.

Several different situations are presented such as a house on fire, falling down and unable to get up, someone being sick and not waking up and seeing someone with gun. This book has a firefighter, a policeman and a paramedic to respond to the different emergencies.

For each of the situations the book suggests calling 911 and lets children know what to do. It reminds them to state their name and to tell the nice person on the other end of the phone what the emergency is. I have been practicing this with 4 year old Sonny and he is getting very good at it with the help of this book and the keypad. I also used a real phone to see if he could pick out the right numbers there since it does look a little bit different than the bright red keypad. He did great, so I feel that this book is a tremendous aid in being able to teach children about using this emergency service and also the importance of it.

This book also tells children that 911 isn’t for fun, but only for emergencies. On the opposite page of that message is a place for a child to write their address if they know it. On a small print note on this page there is the reminder that it is recommended that children memorize their address as early as possible.

What I really like about this book is that it reinforces dialing correctly by the sound of a siren going off when the 911 is dialed. Of course the kids love hearing this and so are eager to learn the correct numbers to push. We have talked about the fact that a real telephone won’t have a siren that goes off, but it will bring them the help they need if they need it. When incorrect numbers are pressed there is a ::thud:: sound that lets the child know they haven’t dialed right. The sirens will only sound when the number is correctly dialed.

The illustrations are simple cartoon style using several different boys and girls of varying ethnicities, height and hair colors. The drawings are simple with just the right amount of detail to allow a child who cannot read the ability to understand what is happening on each page.

The text is a brown/red and although it is a bit small, it is placed where it can be easily seen and doesn’t present a problem for me when reading to the two children I am caring for. I do think because of the small text and small size of the book itself, measuring just 7” x 7”, it would be a difficult book to hold up and read to a classroom. It makes a better one on one book too because then each child has the opportunity to practice with the telephone keypad.

As you can tell from my review, I really recommend this book as a wonderful fun story and a fantastic teaching aid too.

Penton Overseas, Inc. published this 14 page board book in 2002. No author is listed.

ISBN: 15591252741


Recommended:
Yes 

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