The Berenstain Bears and the Double Dare

This is a really good book. Everyone of the Berenstain Bear books has a wonderful lesson in it.

My four year old son has started collecting these books, and it's been a real treasure to read them to him because they bring back memories from my own childhood. He loves the stories just as much as I do. We especially love reading the little poems on the first page of each book! Each book teaches a different lesson. I love using them as examples of what not to do and also as positive reinforcement for my children.

This is such a great book to teach kids not to just "follow the leader" and to think for yourself. Brother Bear goes to get his sister's jump rope back from the school bully and they dare him to do some bad things. When Brother is dared to steal a watermelon from a friend's patch, he resists at first but then they "dee double dare" him and well, off he goes. Brother finds out that he's been found out by his friend, Farmer Ben, and Ben then tells Brother of the dangers of following someone instead of thinking for yourself. It's really interesting how they did this - Farmer Ben tells Brother that sheep will follow a leader anywhere, even off a cliff. You just have to learn not to be like sheep and think for yourself. So when Too-Tall Grizzly tries once again to get Brother to do something bad, Brother calls Too-Tall and his gang, "Sheep." It's a great lesson, one that is easily remembered and very well done. If you're interested, this one is also done on a dvd and it's great too! We love it in our house. Highly recommend!

This is a good book about peer pressure. My 5 year-old son enjoyed the story. Some of the life lessons we talked about while reading this story are 1) thinking for yourself, 2) friends don't call friends names, and 3) never take something that does not belong to you.I especially liked how Farmer Ben taught Brother Bear to not allow being called names (i.e. chicken) to cause him to be misled. Farmer Ben also used a story about sheep to teach a good lesson about the importance of thinking for yourself.Brother Bear uses the lessons learned from Farmer Ben while handling his next encounter with the Too-Tall Gang (yet another double dare). This time he is not misled because he thinks for himself, sticks with what he knows is right, and says no.

Peer pressure is the definition of this book. A bully, Too Tall Grizzly dares Brother to steal from a close neighbor. Brother doesn't want to be a chicken - so he does it anyway and is caught. The neighbor gives Brother great advice that he carries with him and is helpful in his next encounter.