Tag: sliding panels

Posted in Toddler Reads

Twirl board books are ready for Spring!

Posted on by Rosemary Kiladitis

How adorable are board books? And now that I’m living Nana Life, I’m enjoying them even more. These books, by the way, are all granddaughter-approved; fun additional notes in the reviews.

Baby Animal Mazes, by Susann Hoffmann, (Feb. 2026, Twirl Books), $16.99, ISBN: 9782408061951

Ages 2-4

Baby animals need our help! Baby Duck, Baby Bear, Baby Fox, Baby Rabbit, and Babies Blue and Orange Bird have places they need to go, but their paths are missing big pieces from them: fortunately, readers have those pieces and can connect the paths by choosing one. So much fun for toddlers and preschoolers, this sturdy board book has three easy-to-remove pieces with different pieces to connect the mazes in the book. It’s an exciting introduction to problem-solving and foundational math skills. Pieces store easily in the book for the next time. Each spread provides a little story to each baby animal’s dilemma and cheers players on. Illustrations are bright and colorful, perfect for young learners. Sunshine (my nickname for Granddaughter) is only 10 months old but enjoyed playing with the maze pieces and was happy to see the animals, so if your little is younger than 2, show them the book! The board book pages will hold up. If you’re using this in a public library or school library, better to keep this one for storytime reference or playtime, when it’ll be cleaned up and put back afterwards. It’s great fun for a Family Place play area or storytime!

 

Clack-Clack, Little Crab! (Clickety Clack), by Amy Blay, (March 2026, Twirl Books), $14.99, ISBN: 9782408061807

Ages Birth-3

Little Crab wakes up and wants to play with friends! This board book proves to be great fun for littles of all ages with side pulls on each spread that make a clacking sound, just like Little Crab’s claws, and a reveal of a new underwater friend. The text plays with sounds like “swish swosh”, “scritch, scratch, scritch”, “splish, splash, splish”, “plip, plop”, “WHEEEEEE”, and, naturally, “click-clack”. Each pull of the side handles awakens sleepy snails, starfish, and fish, ready to play with Little Crab. Bold and colorful illustration pair with activity-driven text; combined with the sound and activity of the click-clack side pull, this is a feast for toddler senses. Clack-Clack, Little Crab! is a companion to Crack-Crack, Who is That? (2022). The pulls and pages are sturdy and will hold up to a lot of pulling and play, so put this in a circulating collection and watch the kids light up. Sunshine thoroughly enjoys this book and has figured out pretty quickly how to pull on the side pulls to get the “click-clack”.

 

 

Big Brain Puzzles: Plant Pandemonium!, by Camille Pichon, (March 2026, Twirl Books), $14.99, ISBN: 9782408061814

Ages 6+

A board book for bigger kids! Plant Pandemonium! contains 45 different garden challenges within its 10 pages: puzzles involve lifting flaps to grow a group of plants; sliding puzzle pieces together to help earthworms dig underground tunnels, and pulling tabs to organize a group of butterflies’ flying order. Each challenge has three levels to complete, giving readers a wealth of brain teasers to develop math and reasoning skills. The pages are sturdy but a cautionary suggestion to keep this out of your board book sections; littler hands risk tearing flaps and pulls. Little ones can use the book for play and exploration (Sunshine did – she likes the worms best so far), but for repeated use, you’re going to want to keep a separate copy in your Nonfiction sections for kindergarten and elementary students’ use. This is a fun one; I hope we get more Big Brain Puzzles in the future.

 

T. Rex (Ultimate Discovery), by Raphaële Glaux/Illustrated by Amélie Falière, (March 2026, Twirl Books), $10.99, ISBN: 9791027613885

Birth-3

Okay, this is the one I was waiting for: is it Sunshine’s favorite, or is it mine? BOTH. Ultimate Discovery is a spin-off of Twirl’s Ultimate Spotlight series, just perfect for littler learners. Here, a T. Rex teaches readers about their prehistoric life, from hatching to hunting. Each spread has sliding panels that reveal a baby T. Rex hatching from its egg; opening and closing their massive jaws, and allowing a Triceratops to charge at them. Descriptive text is brief and enticing, providing interesting details about the dinosaur; additional vocabulary runs throughout, including names of other dinosaurs, names of flora, and dino attributes. Sunshine loves playing with the slides and I’ve managed to get one “RAHR!” out of her so far. This one will hold up to multiple reads; put it in your board book collections. Kids love dinos!

 

Posted in Toddler Reads

It’s Board Book time!

Posted on by Rosemary Kiladitis

More board books, you say? I’ve got more board books! Let’s dive right in, there are some gems here!

A Little Snail Book: Hide-and-Seek, by Shasha Lv, (March 2021, Chronicle Books), $10.99, ISBN: 9781452183596

Ages 0-3

A companion to A Little Snail Book: Time to Go Home, Hide-and-Seek is a fun seek and find game for your little ones, starring Bear, who’s the seeker. As Bear wanders through each page, questions pop up that invite your little eagle-eyed Kiddos to see if they can find who’s hiding: “Where is everyone hiding?” “Could someone be here?” One by one, Bear discovers their friends, with a fun sound effect upon discovery: clunks, squeaks, and meows abound, letting you get into the act with your readers. But… where is Little Snail? Bear is stumped, but maybe your little ones can figure it out! Absolute fun, with sturdy pages and cheery two-color artwork.

 

Whose Baby is This?, by Stéphanie Babin/Illustrated by Camille Tisserand, (Feb. 2021, Twirl Books), $14.99, ISBN: 9782408023898

Ages 0-3

Match animal parents and babies! Sliding panels give little fingers something to explore as they slide the baby panel back and forth to reveal the parent panel. Seek and find the grownups on the left-hand panel. Organized into habitats – At the Pond, In the Forest, On the Farm, In the Meadow, On the Mountain, and In the Savanna – kids can find a wide variety of animals and learn the names for both children and adults! Colorful and kid-friendly illustrations, plus fun facts, make this a nice choice for learning about animals. Companion books in the series include Who Eats What?, Who Lives Where?, and Who Does What?

Miki Gets Dressed, by Stéphanie Babin/Illustrated by Julie Mercier, (Feb. 2021, Twirl Books), $12.99, ISBN: 9782408019723

Ages 0-3

It’s time to go outside, and kids can help Miki the Lion get dressed by pulling tabs! Help Miki pull up a pair of green pants; pull down a green sweater, slide on orange shoes, and don a red raincoat. A fun pop-up reveal at the end of the book will delight little ones, and the pull tabs are sturdy enough to hold up to multiple reads. This would be a great concept readaloud, with the emphasis on colors, and can also work for a fun rainy day readaloud, too. Add Hello, Rain! by Kyo Maclear, and Linda Ashman’s Rain! for a fun storytime on a cloudy day. A readloud on getting dressed would be great, too: add Caroline Jayne Church’s Let’s Get Dressed, and What We Wear: Dressing Up Around the World by Maya Ajmera, Cynthia Pon, Elise Hofer Derstine, and the Global Fund For Children.

More to come! Enjoy these in the meantime!

Posted in Preschool Reads, Toddler Reads

#HomesCool for Littles: Board Books with a mission!

Posted on by Rosemary Kiladitis

I’ve been thoroughly enjoying the great board books that are loaded with learning activities for tiny hands to explore. Turning wheels, sliding panels, flaps, these books are filled with fun and imagination. Let’s take a look at a few.

Turn•Seek•Find: Habitats, by Ben Newman, (Feb. 2021, Twirl), $14.99, ISBN: 9782408019693

Ages 3-5

Perfect for preschoolers, this larger board book (11″x9.5″) takes readers on a journey to five different areas – the African Savanna, the Ice Field, the Indian Jungle, the Pacific Island, and the Big City – and talks a little about the kind of habitat each one provides, along with fun seek and find activities at the turn of a wheel. Two wheels on each spread encourages readers to discover different items and colors within the spreads. The artwork is bright and cold, with eye-catching colors and details that kiddos will love exploring. Perfect for cultivating observation skills and fine motor skills, the book is sturdy and will hold up to multiple readings. Find books and facts about each spread to encourage littles to go deeper and learn more. Ask kids what they recognize from the spreads and encourage them to find out more about things that may be new. Never seen a baobab tree before? Look it up on kid-friendly sites like National Geographic and find books like John Archambault’s By the Baobab Tree. There are so many ways to encourage and extend learning with a fun book like this; let it be your jumping-off point and follow your little’s interests.

 

Matching Game Book: Bugs and Other Little Critters, by Stéphanie Babin/Illustrated by Manu Callejón (March 2021, Twirl Books), $16.99, ISBN: 9782408024659
Ages 3-5
Another fun, larger-sized board book with activities to keep little brains busy! Meet the bugs that live in the meadow, at the pond, in the forest, in the ground, and in the dark! Sliding panels allow kids to play a memory game on each spread, and additional suggested activities encourage kids to play seek and find, I Spy, and Hide and Seek. Panels slide easily back and forth; no struggles here. The insects are cute, with big, expressive eyes and are colorful and kid-friendly. Excellent manipulation for fine motor skills, and pair with Eric Carle books like The Very Grouchy Ladybug and The Very Lonely Firefly. Bob Barner’s Bugs, Bugs, Bugs! is a great choice, too. There are so many “Buggie Books”, as my Kiddo used to refer to them, out there  – just ask your favorite librarian! The Spruce Crafts has some adorable and easy bug-related crafts, too: I’m partial to the ladybug hat and firefly suncatcher.
Animal Friends 1 2 3, by Christophe Loupy/Illustrated by Shunsake Satake, (Feb. 2021, Twirl Books), $14.99, ISBN: 9782408024680
Ages 3-5
A lift-the-flap counting book with a fun spin, Animal Friends 1 2 3 has a fun question-and-answer format that encourages readers’ curiosity: “5 little bears are busy picking blueberries. 2 got a wee bit hungry!”  The facing spread has five little smiling bears sitting among minimalist blueberry trees. Easy-to-lift flaps reveal two bears snacking on blueberries. Colored dots run across the bottom of each spread, adding a fun visual component. The story also includes basic addition skills, with a group of 4 mice inviting groups of friends to their party, and increasing their number: “‘Let’s invite our 4 performer friends!’ says the fourth mouse. ‘With them, there will be 9 of us. They can show us magic tricks!'” Flaps will reveal the four friends, while dots across the bottom of the page will account for all nine characters. Good for preschoolers developing their math skills and toddlers who are learning their 123s. There are so many great printables for little counters available. Teaching 2 and 3 Year Olds has some fun printables, On Teachers Pay Teachers, Play to Learn Preschool has a fun apple counting printable, and Kamp Kindergarten has an adorable school bus clip and count activity.