Big sister Sophie settled down with 2-year-old Pierre to show him the pictures and turn the pages of Read-along Fairy Tales, as they listened to the CD. I’ve already noticed before that young children’s attention span is much greater when they’re listening to a CD accompanying a book rather than a parent (or sibling) reading the story aloud and this was certainly the case here. Pierre loved the different voices and the sound effects and excitedly pointed out things in the pictures and giggled.
The book and CD contain nine popular fairy stories: The Gingerbread Man, The Three Little Pigs, The Princess and the Pea, Little Red Riding Hood, Rapunzel, The Ugly Duckling, Goldilocks and the Three Bears, Hansel and Gretel, and Jack and the Beanstalk. Each story is only a few pages long and lasts just a few minutes on the CD so they are ideal for a quick bedtime story. You can also choose the track you want on the CD so you can pick out the selected story without having to fastforward through the whole CD.
The book itself is a lovely hardback board book that will resist no end of page-turning, dropping on the floor and nibbling (or is it just Pierre who likes to “taste” the books he’s reading?!) Each page has a large colourful illustration to really keep little listeners’ attention on the book and older readers can listen to the words and follow them in the book so it’s a great tool for reinforcing reading too.
The book is also lovely to read on its own without the CD and the CD is great in the car on long journeys with or without the book so it’s a fabulous 3-in-1 investment.
star rating : 5/5
