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Before you dismiss me as a humorless PC drone who hates fun, ask yourself: would you read this book to your kid in front of an actual Mexican. Mexicans party and sleep all day and eat a lot of beans, apparently. I was halfway through reading this to my daughter when I realized that I was tempering my volume because I didn't want my neighbor to hear me through the wall of my row house. What a pile of racist crap.
I had to stop several times. Half my class is Latino and they didn't seem upset by it- they were howling with laughter.
I decided it's harmless and if the kids love it, relax. It is in our school library (with mostly minority children) and was donated by a local family.
I was handed this book by one of my first grade students, not having ever seen the book. I admit, I was a little surprised by what I thought could easily be seen as racial themes.
It's a great book. I read it during story time and they were SCREAMING with laughter.
It is a very, very funny book.
I highly recommend it. My sons think this story is hilarious. I like that it shows imagination and has a funny ending.
The kids laugh at this antics and enjoy acting the book out once we've gone through it once. Kids pretend their the little siamese kitten who thinks he's a chihuahua and come up with their own adventures. As a teacher, I crave books such as this one: it's the centerpiece to a unit on using the imagination. After reading the book and acting it out in the classroom, we then take to the outdoors or to another room where we create our own "Skippy Jon Jones" adventures. They enjoy showing the class their own stories or telling their own stories.Recently, I used this on a rainy day and we had a blast burning off energy as we sang out some of the poems and acted out our own stories.He's fun, he's lively, and he's inviting to children of all ages. With a group of kindergartners, I opened a unit on rhythmic movement by reading the book to them. Who doesn't love the idea of a small kitten with a huge imagination.
This book is so much fun to read aloud to kids. I love how silly these books are, and how imaginative Skippyjon Jones is. I also love how it changes from rhyme, to song, to no particular pattern at all, and back again.
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