Book review: Fancy Nancy: Poet Extraordinaire!
Fancy Nancy was my own wake-up call about not judging a book
by its cover. I avoided these books for my girls because I assumed they were
about being pretty and having the right clothes, and things that I didn’t want
my girls to get caught up in.
One day, my youngest found “Fancy
Nancy: Poet Extraordinaire” at the library and asked to check it out. I do
my very best to let them pick out whatever interests them at the library, so I
let her. Naturally, then she needed me to read it to her. I was happily
surprised by the story.
It turns out that Fancy Nancy like fanciness in all aspects
of her life. Yes, her clothing and appearance is one aspect of her fanciness,
it is also treated in the book as somewhat of a given, and not discussed. I
suppose the illustrations do that part. She also loves fancy words, and this it
turns out is the theme of this book. Fancy Nancy is trying to write a poem, and
read other poems in her quest to write a great fancy poem. She learns new fancy
words along the way, and their meanings. It reminded me more than a little bit
of the “Martha
Speaks” book and television series in that way.
More importantly, my daughter loved it, and wanted to talk
about some of the words she learned. So it has been a lesson to me. My original
rule to myself – to not judge what books my children pick out to read – has served
us both well again. And making assumptions about a book I haven’t read or
bothered to learn anything about almost cost us a wonderful read, and
vocabulary building experience. I don’t know if all the Fancy Nancy books
follow this same theme, but I do know that I will no longer be hesitant to
check out more to read with my daughter and find out.
1 comment:
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