Exactly the Opposite

My three year old and I enjoy this book together. It allows for a great conversation between us at each reading. Also, it successfully taught my daughter the concept of opposites in a fun an interactive way! Great book!

My daughter's preschool had this book on their recommendation list to help teach kids oppisites. This book has no words only pictures of oppisites, like a page of eggs next to a page of broken eggs, boy on hammock, and hammock alone. Great book, beautiful pictures. My 2 and 4 year olds, loved it, and much like the Carl books you make up your own story.

I bought this as a gift for a precocious toddler who absolutely adores books. Her ideal day is spent wandering from book to book, preferably with you reading all of them out loud to her. What I like about this book is that it's open-ended. You can talk about the pictures in any way that you like. There are no words and -- like viewing a painting in a museum -- there is no single right way to react. You can respond to the cover art as "tied" and "untied," but you can also choose neat/messy, or new/old, or tying/sitting, or any other combination of words you choose. Furthermore, just because the pictures include opposites, and the title mentions opposites, there are no rules which say you have to take notice of the opposites. You could just as easily choose to talk about the colors, or shapes, or what's in the background. Because of this, I think this book is well suited for kids who don't want to "sit still and listen." It's a book that is well-suited for interaction and discussion. So ultimately, what I like about this book is that it requires you to engage your brain, and to respond yourself, instead of accepting a path that was pre-determined by the author. Of course, that's exactly what offended this particular toddler about this book: She was looking forward to someone else reading aloud to her, and was rather surprised to discover that not all books are like that. After an inspection to verify that there were, indeed, no words printed on the pages, she took away the "defective" picture book and brought out another for me to read to her.

Tana Hoban's Exactly the Opposite is a wonderful book to use with young children who are learning the concept of "opposite". This wordless book allows readers to interpret the photographs as they understand them.A photograph shows two hands - one is open and the other closed. Two photographs show children on steps - in one picture they are going up and in the other they are coming down. In another photograph there are two shoes - one tied and one untied. Children can act out these opposites by opening and closing their hands, undoing a shoelace and so on. The photographs are large, clear, colorful and attention-grabbers for young children. Exactly the Opposite is exactly the right book to teach the concept of opposites to young children!