Buzz Buzz, Bumble Kitty

Carla Hyde English 385.005 April 17, 2001 Dr. Michelle H. Martin Critical Reflection 3 Sharratt, Nick. Buzz Buzz, Bumble Kitty. New York: Barron's Educational Series, Inc., 2000. Young, Bill. Article: Children's Literature in the Middle and Secondary Classroom. Dakota Writing Project. http://www.usd.edu/engl/young97ar1.html. Visual learning on Children Buzz Buzz, Bumble Kitty is a very mind stimulating book. Sharratt causes the reader to think and try to guess what picture is going to come up next. He does that by splitting the page up and put half of the text on one side and half of the picture on the other. You then flip the other part of the page and you have a completed picture and completed text. But before you flip you have part of the previous picture on the page leaving you to guess what picture is coming up and the sound that it makes. The coloring of the illustrations go hand in hand, for example, part of the black and yellow bumble bee is showing while half of the cowboys face is showing. The cowboys eye brows and mustache are yellow and black. The writing is bold black on an all white background. This causes the writing to stand out and makes it easier to read. Visual learning helps children to better understand what they are reading. Visual learning techniques help children clarify thinking and reinforce understanding. When children have a picture and text together it helps them to group together and organize their thoughts. They can make the connection between the pictures and the text. When children have an illustration they get a better grasp on what they are reading, and because of that they can put the story in their own words. The illustrations reinforce what they are reading and help them to pull together their own thoughts. This allows them to use imagination. In the book Buzz Buzz, Bumble Kitty, you can read the sound that the object will make before you see the whole picture. This helps to get the imagination running and it stimulates the child's brain. Clarifying thinking and reinforcing understanding are two very important techniques used in visual learning and the visual effects on a child. Illustrations and text work hand in hand together. The illustrations should make the story stronger, but not different. Many people think that illustrations have to be bright and vibrant in order to appeal to children, but that's not the case at all. Pastels are said to be soothing and canencourage learning. The visual elements in Sharratt's book are not pastels but they are actually the true color of the objects. Buzz Buzz, Bumble Kitty helps children learn what a cat looks like or a building. The illustrations work together with the text, in that the story tells the sound that the cat or the bee makes as well as what the object is. That way a child could look at the work cat and see a picture of a cat. Sharratt's book demonstrates this very well because the print is easy to read. In order for print to be sufficient to read

Buzz Buzz Bumble Kitty is one of my favorite books to use for class visits at the library or story time for kids, age preschool through grade 3. This book is a sure-fire crowd pleaser! The words are simple, and the pictures have 2 levels, which can be changed independently. The pictures and the way the storyteller can change them do the communicating. This also makes it great to read to children who speak languages other than English.