The Berenstain Bears and Baby Makes Five

My 6-year old brought home the "Birds, Bees, and Berenstain Bears" book from his school library and was left on the edge of his seat at the end. As the library doesn't have this book, we had to get it to find out whether the new baby is a boy or girl. As a parent, I liked this book far more than the previous book, which was a little more anatomically technical than my son needed. My son enjoys the story, and I do not have any "Go ask your father" questions popping up at various points!

buy this to help my niece understand the changes that a new baby would bring into her life

We got this book before my daughter was born to read to our 2 year old son. We had hoped that it would ease the transition from being an only child to an older brother. This book is easy to read, isn't too long and has great illustrations.

Sister Bear looks at her new sister, Honey, and proclaims, "What a nuisance!" while Brother Bear plays happily with Honey. From Sister Bear's perspective, Honey brings disruption and draws the attention away from Sister Bear. Brother Bear remembers what it was like when Sister Bear was born, so he doesn't find it too disruptive. The story looks at how to make a young sibling with a new baby sister or brother feel better.Sister Bear notices that Honey is "crying, feeding, burping, spitting up, and diapering around the clock." "And when it wasn't those things, it was cuddling, dandling, fussing, and kitchy-cooing . . . or shopping, shopping, and more shopping . . . ."Sister Bear is not fond of the smell of deployed baby diapers, and likes it even less when she is asked to wash out the diapers.Mother Bear notices that there is a problem when Sister Bear leaves Honey out of a drawing of her family for a school project. Sister Bear explains that "there wasn't enough room on the paper!"Mother Bear pulls out the old videos of when Sister Bear was a baby, and Sister Bear sees that she got the same treatment that Honey is getting now. Sister Bear goes back up to her room, and draws Honey into the picture.It's bedtime, and Sister Bear wants to know, "'Mama,' said Sister, 'could we take a peek at the baby first?'" "'You know something?' she whispered, 'She is kind of cute.'"As you can see, young siblings of new babies often feel displaced and disgruntled by all of the attention the new baby gets and the attention that they do not receive. Parents would do well to share this book with that older child. If you do have videos, films, or photographs of when the child was younger, those are good to look at as this story suggests. Naturally, the best thing to do is to use the new baby as a way to make the older child feel more important and loved. That has to begin before the baby comes home.After you read this book, also think about ways that you can find out how your child is feeling before problems arise. Bedtime is a great occasion for such chats.Help others find the bright side of change . . . always!

It has been my concern and the concern of other critics and fans of the Berenstain Bears that over the past number of the year, quality has yielded to quantity as we have seen an explosion of titles from Stan and Jan Berenstain but less substantive topics and quality illustrations (The Berenstain Bears Baby Bear Board Books, Jellybean Books, and titles like "The Berenstain Bears and the Mad, Mad, Mad Toy Craze" are examples). And just when you thought they had pulled out all the stops in trying to derive even heftier profits by adding a new member to the family, it turns out that planning and care went into the creation of this book and it stands out among recent Berenstain Bears releases. The book, along with the prequel titled "The Birds, the Bees, and the Berenstain Bears," published earlier this year, was intended to address many of the issues that were neglected in the classic "Berenstain Bears New Baby." Thankfully, Stan and Jan have done a fine job and my faith (though only wavering slightly) in this series is once again strong. I do encourage parents and children to check out this title as it does illustrate the challenges associated with jealously many kids may feel when attention is suddenly focused upon a new infant. Stan and Jan have said themselves that they have been considering this book for a long time and I think this shows itself positively--thought and energy has been put into this title and I wish that the Berenstain family might consider this correlation in the future. You can't rush art, and with over 30 new titles in the past two years, some might say the Berenstain Bears were/are being sacrificed in this nature. Whatever your opinions on the topic, The Berenstain Bears and Baby Makes Five is a good book and one you should definitely add to your Bears collection.