Ship Shapes

This is a wonderfully engaging board book about shapes! Young readers will find it enormously fun to discover the objects hidden in the illustrations. Rectangles and squares are transformed into houses, triangles masquerade as sails, and fish are comprised of diamonds. There is a seemingly endless supply of shapes that are buried like treasures in the sea and surrounding town. As evidenced by the interior photos above and below, the illustrations are beautifully bright, which is very attractive to young readers. For parents, it is fascinating to see how all the items are carefully crafted from materials. Small squares of blue patterned fabrics are sewn together into a patchwork of a sea, cream colored cottons make up the ship sails, and a host of bright materials form the fish. The attention paid to detail is what makes this book extra special. This book is an excellent tool for teaching children shape recognition. A shape chart on the first page details the nine shapes the readers should be looking for. Make shape learning fun for your toddler with this jewel of a book.

The artwork in this book is so cheerful and cleverly done. It gives you a really fun way to teach shapes to your child. The discovery of a sunken treasure chest adds to the adventure and excitement for the child. The boats and fish are so colorful you wish you could jump into the pictures. I took it out of my library but am going to buy a copy for my child. She is 22 months old and is learning her shapes, but is not able to count high enough to count the number of some of the shapes on the pages. But then, that means she can grow with the book. And isn't that exactly what you want out of a children's book?