From the author of Roly-Poly Egg comes a story of one hungry little bird on the search for something to eat. Confetti is hungry, so she asks her animal friends what she should eat. But everything they suggest sounds yucky.
Snack Time for Confetti by author/illustrator Kali Stileman is absolutely charming. From the storyline to the artwork the details blend together to create an engaging story that will entertain your child ages 3 – 7. Confetti visits with a giraffe, a zebra, an elephant and more trying to find out what she should eat. The book teaches children what various animals eat, even though it’s a story to simply be enjoyed. With a great and funny ending, Snack Time for Confetti will be read time and again.
Rating: 
Hardcover: 32 pages
Publisher: Tiger Tales (March 1, 2013)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 158925127X
ISBN-13: 978-1589251274
I received a free copy of this book from the publisher. This review contains my honest opinions, for which I have not been compensated in any way.
The Red House Children’s Book Award is the only national book award in the UK voted for entirely by children and it’s super easy for you and any children you spend time with to get involved.
All the kids need to do is read all each book in the category (categories) of their choice and then vote, by ranking the books in order of preference. I’m getting the kids at my girls’ school voting and here’s how we’re running our sessions.
Every Friday afternoon I have a 1 hour slot with groups of 5-7 year olds where we read and craft and do whatever I can think of to showcase reading for pleasure, reading for joy. I’m currently using this slot to read all four shortlisted books in the Younger Children category ie picture book category. The shortlisted books in this category are:
Scruffy Bear and the Six White Mice by Chris Wormell (which I reviewed here)
Rollo and Ruff and the Little Fluffy Bird by Mick Inkpen
Peely Wally by Kali Stileman (which I reviewed here)
Don’t Worry Douglas by David Melling
You can buy all four books at discounted prices on the Red House website, here.
All these picture books are quite short picture books and so I’ve found it works just fine reading them all in one go with the 30 kids in my group. Normally after
[With apologies to readers in the Southern Hemisphere...] Are you looking for a little sprinkling of colour and humour to help you get through these last days of winter before spring arrives? If so, Peely Wally, the debut picture book from Kali Stileman may be just the thing you’re looking for.
Photo: bortescristian
Peely Wally is a very happy bird. She has just laid an egg and is proud and thrilled. But in her excitement at the impending arrival of her baby, she bounces so hard on her twig that the egg rolls off and away. The poor egg tumbles down here, over there, only just avoids being eaten and eventually, with the help of all the neighbouring animals, survives the adventure and is returned to a much relieved Mum.
But then the most exciting thing of all happens… the egg cracks, and… well I’m sure you can guess what happens, but it’s nevertheless lovely, heartwarming and fun to reveal.
This simple tale is great fun for the younger crowd. There’s just the right amount of adventure, a suggestion of disaster, a reassuring rescue, and a great deal of love and care. But it’s the vibrant illustrations which will really get the kids coming back for more. Created in collage style, inevitably (and successfully) reminiscent of Eric Carle, they zing with colour and texture.
What’s more, I suspect that many kids won’t just listen to the story, they will actually play with this book: A dotted line across every page indicates the path of the egg and my kids love tracing this with their finger while the slopes and loop-the-loops encourage me to read the text in an even more sing-song fashion than normal.
Although I’d wholeheartedly recommend this book to any young family I bumped into in the bookshop, two tiny question marks hang over the book for me. First, the eponymous title. Personally, I like it – it suggests something fun and unusual. But I do wonder if some might be turned off by it (and perhaps the editors have thought this too – the book is being released outside of the UK under the title “Roly-Poly Egg”). It puts me in mind of another book I enjoy reading with the girls, but which I’ve heard hasn’t been very successful because of its title – The Terrible, Greedy Fossifoo by Charles Fuge.
Second, as this book will be a hit with the youngest of readers, and contains a wonderful lift-the-flaps page at the denouement of the story, it really deserved to be published on much more robust paper or even as a board book. The flaps, such as they are, will soon be torn, for they are thin and flimsy. This is such a shame for instead of letting my kids excitedly unveil what’s behind the flaps, I’m nervous about pages being ripped and this somewhat diminishes the story’s final impact.
However, put aside these two tiny gripes and what you have here is the perfect nonreligious book for Easter, an ideal gift for Mums-to-be and a peppy pick-me-up tonic to banish the winter blues. A treat for the preschool crowd, and a book that’s received a big thumbs up from both my girls. Do look
.jpeg?picon=3306)
I do it with year 7s so very different approach (and sadly no little chicks!). They get a rating sheet for each book and need to look at text/picture coordination, ease of understanding, fluency of text, general suitability for targeted audience. I emphasise that they must look at the books not as 11/12 year-olds but as 3/4/5 year-olds. For example last year Dragon Stew had a huge pile of dragon poo in it: not particularly funny of you are 12, but hilarious if you are 3!
It works well and even though they are often reticent to start with, they really get into it. It is lovely seeing them read the stories to each other.
It’s brilliant to hear another way of doing this Library Mice – thankyou for sharing. I’d love to do a session with both age groups – I can imagine the older ones reading to the younger ones and the older ones perhaps secretly enjoying the craft (or am I being ridiculously naive?!)