Perrazo y Perrito (Big Dog and Little Dog)

Reviewed by: Melissa Madigan MB - Merrill Memorial Library, Yarmouth, Southern Maine Library District

Review Date: February 6, 2017

Review

This is a great and comprehensive easy reader for children who are - or are becoming - bilingual. It is labeled on the back cover by guided reading level (D), Reading Recovery Level (5-6), Age (4-6), and lexile level. Written in both English and Spanish (with each sentence translated directly underneath), it tells the story of Perrazo (Big Dog) and Perrito (Little Dog) as they go about their day together. The story starts with the two of them then, once full, taking a nap together. The end of the book highlights the friendship between the two dogs, as it shows them "lonely" in their separate beds, and subsequently hopping into one bed together. The illustrations are delightfully appealing, and the cartoonish quality works well for this age group. The book also has a "match the sentence to the picture" section in the back, a sequencing activity that invites readers to put the scenes (5 in all) in the right order, and an introduction to identifying nouns and verbs. The fact that this book is bilingual makes it stand out from a lot of easy readers that I've seen and would work well for children who are ESL or those who are simply getting a jump-start on learning a second language.

Overall Book Score: very good