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#70 Rhyming Dust Bunnies by Jan Thomas (2009)
27 points
Another favorite read aloud. You get to do funny voices for Ed, Ned, Ted and especially the prone to (not unwarranted) hysteria, Bob. It’s also a great call and response book that lets kids answer the question of “What rhymes with…?” When I was a bookseller, I would sell at least one copy every time I read it. – Sharon Thackston
Can you honestly believe that the last time I conducted this poll Jan Thomas didn’t make an appearance on it anywhere? I suppose it makes a bit more sense when you consider how the poll was conducted in 2009 and that was when Ms. Thomas was just beginning to create delicious books like the one featured here today. So it is with great pleasure that I welcome her to the Top 100 list. Hello, Jan! Glad you could make it.
The description from my review reads, “Meet the rhyming dust bunnies: Ed, Ned, Ted, and Bob. As they like to say ‘We rhyme all the time!’ On this particular day Ed starts them off with wondering ‘Hey! What rhymes with car?’ Everyone puts in a vote except for Bob. Bob’s sort of staring in the distance and saying things like ‘Look!’ and ‘Look Out!’ The other bunnies are confused by Bob’s seeming inability to rhyme. Even when he says ‘Look out! Here comes a big scary monster with a broom!’ they’re not quite catching on. Finally he screams out ‘Run for it!’ and the troop run and hide under a dresser. However, when they attempt to restart their rhyming antics, ’sat’ ‘pat’ and ‘rat’ are completed with Bob’s timely ‘vacuum cleaner!’ and with a mighty ‘Thwptt’ off they go.”
The urban legend about Ms. Thomas’s rise is that she was an SCBWI discovery. An editor was doing manuscript consultations, saw the work Ms. Thomas had done for the picture book What Will Fat Cat Sit On? and signed her right there and then. Is it true? Haven’t a clue, really. That sort of thing almost never happens, but it makes for a good tale. As for this particular book it did inspire the sequel going by the name of Here Comes the Big Mean Dust Bunny in which our heroes suffer at the hands of a malevolent dusty fiend.
PW wasn’t entirely on board when they said of it, “Although a little sketchier than Thomas’s previous works, such as What Will Fat Cat Sit On?, this book is just as funny and snappy-looking.”
Indeed School Library Journal was far more positive when it said, “This book will make readers laugh; it will teach them to rhyme; it will enchant them and make them think twice every time they see a vacuum cleaner.”
Ditto Booklist with, “Preschoolers will recognize how it feels to be big but just a mite in a grown-up world, and they will enjoy the playful rhymes and simple wordplay as much as the bold scenarios of the tiniest creatures in danger from giants, and one hero who sees it coming.”
And Kirkus was entirely won over when they said, “With their wide noses, long ears, four-fingered paws and buck teeth, these fuzzy characters are a riot. Put away your cleaning supplies for a little messy fun.”
Oh wow, as it so happens I’ve made this into a readers theater and my second graders are regaling us all this last week of school.
Good call, Bob.
Jennifer in GA said, on 5/23/2012 3:49:00 AM
This was the sleeper hit of my preschool class this year. I think if I had read it every day for the whole school year they would have laughed just as hard as they did on Day One.
rockinlibrarian said, on 5/23/2012 6:20:00 AM
This is quickly becoming one of my favorite go-to read-alouds. It works for older kids and younger kids! And grown-ups!
Rosten said, on 5/23/2012 10:11:00 AM
Am I the only one who hears the voices of Veggie Tales characters in my head when reading this book?
*crickets*
Okay, just me then.
Elizabeth Bird said, on 5/23/2012 1:13:00 PM
Now that you mention it, I suppose I do! I’d never really identified which voices I prefer, but if I were to select them for the Rhyming Dust Bunnies TV show (oh you just KNOW somebody’s pitching that right now) that would be where I’d go. Either that or crazy celebrities. Bob as James Earl Jones, say.
Ever had aspirations to be someone or something other than who or what you are? The piggy in this book, Liam, wants to be a bunny—the Easter bunny, to be exact. He’s willing to put in the hard work, even if it means eating salad. Nobody in his family, except for his grandma, believes he can become the Easter bunny, but Liam remains focused and with his can-do-attitude and support from grandma he makes his dream come true. Jeremy Tankard’s ink and digital media artwork are the icing on the cake (or the foil wrapper on the Easter egg, if I may) adding emotion to the story through little piggy faces and bodies. Liam is adorable and so is this story. (Ages 4-6. Publisher: Feiwel and Friends)
Jan Thomas is one funny author. In her latest book the Easter bunny is doing his best to teach readers how to dye Easter eggs, however, his assistant Skunk keeps getting over-excited and … well, let’s just say he has trouble containing himself. The combination of the bright illustrations and well-timed text create a laugh-out-loud picture book perfect for an Easter story time session. (Ages 2-5. Publisher: HarperCollins)
From the moment Peepsqueak, a chicken, hatches from his egg he is raring and ready to fly. Even though everyone tells him he is not ready, Peepsqueak remains determined and filled with self-belief—the perfect recipe for reaching goals. Leslie Ann Clark uses rhythmic and repetitive text that begs to be read aloud; and her sweet cartoon illustrations give Peepsqueak a delightful amount of bounce. Great for spring and Easter, but definitely an all-year read that is sure to be a request over and over again. (Ages 2-5. Publisher: HarperCollins)
Anita Lobel, a Caldecott Honor Book illustrator, has created a charming little number with 10 Hungry Rabbits. 10 very hungry rabbits set out to find 10 vegetables from the garden for Mama Rabbit’s soup pot. Using gouache and watercolors, Lobel’s illustrations prime readers well with an exploration of color as each rabbit collects their chosen vegetable
It’s time to start prepping for the holiday season. First stop: Halloween. No tricks here—only treats!
When witches go riding,
and black cats are seen,
the moon laughs and whispers,
‘tis near Halloween.
~Author Unknown
Our 2011 Halloween book list spotlights everything from growing pumpkins; overcoming fears (a great topic for youngsters that tend to get a little surprised when they no longer recognize their family and friends due to colorful costumes and scary masks); witches; skeletons; cats and bats; and plain-old, creepy stories that beg to be read on a dark night with a flashlight. From babies to beginning readers to middle graders to young adults, TCBR has you covered.
Publisher’s synopsis: What’s Halloween without a haunted house? Come inside SPOOKY BOO! A HALLOWEEN ADVENTURE – it’s filled with tons of Halloween fun! With spooky lift-the-flaps, icky touch-and-feels, and outrageous mirrors throughout, this is one haunted house that trick-or-treaters will want to visit again and again!
Publisher: Random House Books for Young Readers (July 26, 2011)
Source: Publisher
Publisher’s synopsis: Black is the new black in this darkly tantalizing touch-and-feel extravaganza for the senses! Now babies can enjoy this daring color in a novelty board book chock-full of gorgeous, full-color photographs. There are textures to touch, a flap surprise, and the scratch ‘n’ sniff scent of sweet licorice that you can almost taste!
Seriously, it is! Back-to-school? They’re back now and we’re looking ahead to holiday book ordering and displays. First up: Halloween! Here are some ideas to help you with your book displays:
That went well! A week or two ago I announced that I would begin a new series on this blog. My idea was that children’s librarians always want to see how other children’s librarians tell different stories. It gives us ideas. We can steal ways of telling books and incorporate them into our own storytimes. So I did a post called Storytime Suggestions that consisted of a video of me reading The Noisy Counting Book by Susan Schade along with suggestions on how to present it.
Well I had so much fun that I’m doing it again! And since we already did a Toddler Storytime book last time, let’s go for a Preschool Storytime book this time!
We begin.
Name: Rhyming Dust Bunnies
Author: Jan Thomas
In Print?: You bet.
ISBN: 978-1-4169-7976-0
Best For: Preschool Storytime
Storytime Suggestions: While there’s nothing saying you couldn’t present this book to a group of toddlers or even second graders, I personally feel that the ideal audience for this book is preschoolers (which is to say, 3-5 year olds). First off, when each Dust Bunny asks for words that rhyme with “car” or “cat”, sometimes an enterprising preschooler will interject with suggestions of their own. You can totally use that. And that makes Bob’s ill-rhymed words all the better.
Some librarians I know have performed a kind of Readers’ Theater with this book. They’ve taken colored fluff, be it faux fur or colored cotton balls, and stuck ‘em on the ends of pencils or popsicle sticks. Or, if your office looks anything like my own, you can grab actual dust bunnies and give ‘em a dye job. And googly eyes. Be sure you are well stocked in googly eyes.
The advantage of any Jan Thomas book is that it reads well from a distance. Now in this video I cut off the side of the book once in a while, but it’s rarely a problem because the images are so doggone big. Thomas participates in what I like to call The Todd Parr/Lucy Cousins Effect. Which is to say, if you combine thick black lines and bold colors, kids go gaga. Add in some humor and you’ve come up with the world’s greatest readalouds.
When doing a Jan Thomas books in a preschool storytime you can always begin with this one after the preliminaries. It doesn’t get the children so riled up they won’t sit for more books (unlike, say, Can You Make a Scary Face?), though they may be baffled by the ending. I love Ms. Thomas but while her books read aloud beautifully, her en
10 Comments on Storytime Suggestions: Rhyming Dust Bunnies, last added: 7/8/2010
YES….my second graders love love love Rhyming Dust Bunnies and the equally amazing sequel Here Comes the Big Mean Dust Bunny! The first time I read it aloud they immediately begged me to read it again. I even had one kid come with his parent for conference night and pick up the book to read to his parent before I could begin the conference. My below grade level readers were especially enamored with the Dust Bunnies books because they are both so easy to memorize. Towards the end of the school year some of my lowest readers were reading the books to their former kindergarten teachers’ classes. I can’t tell you how much this means to these kids’ confidence.
Fuse, i’m hoping you’re thinking about Remy Charlip’s Fortunately for your next storytime suggestion. It’s a real shame it didn’t make your top 100 picture book countdown and in my experience is the best 1st & 2nd grade read aloud there is.
Elizabeth Bird said, on 7/7/2010 4:44:00 AM
I confess that I was considering “Unfortunately”. Boy that puppy is a fantastic readaloud, isn’t it? You can always guarantee that the kids (and teachers and parents) won’t have heard it before too. Is the paperback still in print? I will check.
DaNae said, on 7/7/2010 5:06:00 AM
I’m such a fan of RDB. I’ve been doing it as a Reader’s Theater for pretty much every grade, (I’ve done most of Jan Thomas books as such) I’m not a big prop person so no googlily eyes.
Where can I get me one of those dimples? Well done.
Mary said, on 7/7/2010 11:04:00 AM
My whole LIFE is preschool storytime (I run an outreach program that visits Head Starts and Preschools) and RDB is one of our favorites. I tend to be a bit of a yeller when I read it, in fact, one of the kids, after storytime, commented to a teacher that “Miss Mary reads a lot of shouting books”. We also read “The Doghouse” by Thomas, and everytime I say “THE DOGHOUSE” I add a big dramatic “dun dun dun!”… The kids picked up on it and started doing it themselves.
Thomas’s books, with their big print, are perfect for developing print awareness, and RDB is great for helping develop those rhyming skills — I ask the kids to tell me their rhymes (sometimes they get it, sometimes not) and then we see what the bunnies say.
If anyone’s interested, I blog about my preschool storytimes, as well as the wonderful things the preschoolers say, at missmaryliberry.wordpress.com
My Boaz's Ruth said, on 7/7/2010 11:29:00 AM
We got this book for my son for Christmas — I believe after your previous review of it.
My Boaz's Ruth said, on 7/7/2010 11:31:00 AM
Help! I still can’t get the Older Entries link at the bottom of your blog to work (it sends me to a
404 – File or directory not found.
The resource you are looking for might have been removed, had its name changed, or is temporarily unavailable. page)
. And I just tried the Contact Us link and it doesn’t work either! (this just doesn’t do anything!)
Holly said, on 7/7/2010 3:27:00 PM
Always fun to see how somebody else does a book you’ve done a zillion times – thanks! Definitely, totally my kind of read-aloud…Jan Thomas is SO on my list of new favorite authors. Add a little Bob Shea and Mac Barnett plus a whole lot of Mo Willems, and you’re in author heaven! Kids just love it when I start making up rhymes with them afterward and throwing in a “Bob” response, just like following up the pigeon stories asking them “you wouldn’t let the pigeon______would you??” Hey, who doesn’t want to be a children’s librarian??!!??!!
Elizabeth Bird said, on 7/7/2010 8:50:00 PM
Re: The Older Entries dead link – Yep, I’ve let them know about that. A pity they don’t have my posts by month on the sidebar anymore. Hopefully this will get fixed at some point.
Erica Perl said, on 7/8/2010 7:43:00 AM
Ahem, not to flog my own books too hard BUT when it comes to preschool storytime, may I suggest Chicken Butt!
Makes for excellent readers’ theater (divide the crowd into “grown up” and “kid” sides, and let everyone chime in for the “chicken” lines). And if you pause before the page turns and have kids guess the rhyme, you’ll generate a loooong list of rhymes that are perfect for them to use to make their own illustrated books (You know why? Alligator pie! You know who? Bubblegum shoe!).
Happy reading!
Kelli said, on 7/8/2010 11:35:00 AM
Thank you for this resource, and I’ll be trying the dust bunnies out soon. One of my fave readalouds is Alligator Baby by Robert Munsch.
*Picture book for preschoolers through first graders *Tiny bug and You as main characters *Rating: I wish I would have had this idea for Can You Make a Scary Face?
Short, short summary: A bug gives the reader commands such as “Stand up,” “Sit down,” and “Do the chicken dance.” But then, he wants you to pretend a tiny, tickly bug is stuck in the reader’s shirt. And then a giant, hungry frog comes, and the bug wants you to scare him away! So, he tells you to make a scary face, but it turns out that the tickly bug is a pretty big scaredy-cat.
So, what do I do with this book?
1. This book has a built-in activity. The bug is telling the students what to do. You should have the students do the activities with the bug. It is a great book for a winter recess activity and/or a PE or music warm-up.
2. As a shared writing activity, write more pages for the book. You and your class can add more pages before the bug asks you to make a face. What can the bug ask the readers to do? Have fun creating these pages with your class or your children.
3. This book is great for drawing attention to the endmarks: periods, question marks, or exclamation marks. Because the print is big and there are few words per page, students can focus on the punctuation marks. They can also read the words with you, and practice intonations, etc that go with question marks, periods, and exclamation marks.
The Doghouse by Jan Thomas Harcourt Books, September 2008 review copy provided by the publisher
Jan Thomas is my new favorite picture book author based on just two books: I loveloveloved A Birthday for Cow (reviewed here in June). And now Cow, Pig, Duck and Mouse are back with a scary story just right for the season, The Doghouse. (In addition, What Will Fat Cat Sit On? made Katie's 5 Books (New Ones) Every Primary Library Should Have list and I'm pretty sure I will own it, love it, and add it to my own list by the end of this weekend. In addition, I see that Jan Thomas has a new book coming out in 2009. I'm thinking pre-order thoughts.)
The story in The Doghouse begins on the endpapers with Cow, Pig, Duck and Mouse playing with a big red ball. Cow makes a great kick that is headed right for (insert scary music as the pages turn past the title page to the first page of text) the doghouse, which suddenly has a dark sky, a bat across the full moon, thunder and lightning, and skeletal trees around it. First the animals send big, brave, strong Cow in to get the ball. Cow does not come back. (More bats across the moon, and three pairs of wide, frightened eyes left.) Next Pig goes in. Does not come back. Then Duck. Does not come back. Mouse begs Duck to come back, but the scary face of the Dog appears and tells Mouse, "I am having Duck for dinner." After a page of sheer Mouse terror...
***SPOILER ALERT***
...Dog turns back to his dinner guests seated at the table and says with regret in his eyes and voice, "Too mad Mouse couldn't come, too."
But isn't that Mouse peeking in the window? Sure enough, he joins the group for cake in the final endpapers.
Be sure you look for a cameo appearance by the big red ball in the final pages.
5 Comments on The Doghouse by Jan Thomas, last added: 10/17/2008
Although the Doghouse looks like a lovely picture book, and I will seek it out, I am really writing to let you know that Princess Ben had already made it onto the Cybils Sci. Fi./fantasy list, so you can have another go if you like! (I have a list up at my place of what's been nominated--link at top right).
I need to make a run to CTC. I am having bit of withdrawl after missing the last bloggers get together...this is looking like a new basket for my kiddos to dive into. Thank you , thank you. Enjoy the long weekend!
#70 Rhyming Dust Bunnies by Jan Thomas (2009)
Oh wow, as it so happens I’ve made this into a readers theater and my second graders are regaling us all this last week of school.
Good call, Bob.
This was the sleeper hit of my preschool class this year. I think if I had read it every day for the whole school year they would have laughed just as hard as they did on Day One.
This is quickly becoming one of my favorite go-to read-alouds. It works for older kids and younger kids! And grown-ups!
Am I the only one who hears the voices of Veggie Tales characters in my head when reading this book?
*crickets*
Okay, just me then.
Now that you mention it, I suppose I do! I’d never really identified which voices I prefer, but if I were to select them for the Rhyming Dust Bunnies TV show (oh you just KNOW somebody’s pitching that right now) that would be where I’d go. Either that or crazy celebrities. Bob as James Earl Jones, say.