The Jazz Fly

Our household was first introduced to The Jazz Fly shortly after Elizabeth started kindergarten 6 years ago.  She came home raving about a book that her teacher had been reading.  We found the title and she begged that we buy it because she really wanted her brothers to hear the scat-singing fly.

I found this book to be a bit of a challenge to read aloud initially, so fortunately the book comes with a cd to help you navigate all of the "ZA-baza, BOO-zaba, ZEE-zah RO-ni" and other phrases.  Once you practice a few times, the book is really a joy to read aloud.  

I really appreciate the introduction to jazz music and rhythm here.  The fly's scat singing, as well as the pictures of the Jazz Bugs and their snazzy outfits, really makes for a lovely inauguration into jazz for little ones.

City of Ember

I'm finally getting around to posting a few back-logged posts here on The Book Children.  I hope to have a few more posts out, including some collections over the next week or two.  Stay tuned!

The City of Ember is a book that Elizabeth first heard in 4th grade (2 years ago) when her teacher read this first book aloud to the class.  Elizabeth was immediately taken with this book and read the sequel in quick succession. She then started begging Philip to read them as well.  He enjoyed the books as well, although he didn't rave about them quite the way she did.  Here is his synopsis of The City of Ember:

A boy and a girl live in a town that is running out of supplies, and they don't know where to get more. One day the girl finds instructions for something. She finds out that the instructions are the way to get out of Ember. The boys finds a door. He wants to know what's in the door. One day they hear someone going in and out of the door, and they find out that it's not really the door to get out of Ember. They find a door full of boats and they travel down the river to a new place. I kind of liked this book because it had a little girl that was cute, named Poppy. And I like that the end of each chapter is suspenseful.