5 out of 5 stars
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Kids love sound effects. Sssnake on a Ssskate? by Steven V. LeShay is a book full of sound effects. Suzie is a girl who is trying to get a good night’s sleep when a snake on a skate comes into her room. Her father comes in as well when he hears the snake. They want to get the snake to leave without hurting it, so they come up with a cunning and resourceful plan. What was their plan? Did the snake leave? Check out Sssnake on a Ssskate? to find out!
I appreciated the silliness of the story. Having a skating snake in your room is funny enough for young children, but I also liked the picture of Suzie’s father running into her room with a rake to get the snake out. In the beginning, this book starts with a parental note explaining sibilance, which is the noise created by repeated S sounds. It makes a hiss. Most of the words in the story that start with the letter S have more than one S in a row. I appreciated the note explaining to parents how to read this book because it’s clearly meant to be read aloud to a young child. Part of the fun of the story is the way that it is read with sibilance. I liked how the author explained this to the parents before starting the story to make sure the children get the most out of the book as possible.
The only downside I found was that every time the snake was mentioned in the story, it always ended with a question mark. I understand that it was probably meant to highlight how unusual it was to have a snake on a skateboard. However, I found it distracting when it showed up in the middle of a sentence.
I give Sssnake on a Ssskate? a rating of 5 out of 5 stars. It was exceptionally well edited because I found no errors. The question marks mentioned earlier were clearly an intentional choice of style by the author and not serious enough to reduce a star. It was creative, funny, and fun to read out loud.
I recommend this book to young children who like sound effects and animals. This book can be used as a way to talk about other words that contain the S sound, so it opens children up to more phonemic awareness. Sssnake on a Ssskate? is a great story!
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Sssnake on a Ssskate?
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