Product Description

Bear is very big very brown and very busy. His tree house could use a little sprucing up so Bear heads up the ladder with a plan and a bucket of paint. But Little Bear has a plan too-including a little mischief that brings Bear (and his blue paint tumbling down to earth. With gentle rhymes and humor award-winning author and illustrator David McPhail creates a cheery and bumptious bear hug of a story.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #326354 in Books
• Brand: Houghton Mifflin
• Published on: 2003-07-11
• Original language: English
• Dimensions: .12" h x 4.76" w x 8.46" l, .16 pounds
• Binding: Paperback
• 24 pages

From School Library Journal
PreSchool-Grade 2-Two selections that are short, sweet, and delightful. The simple texts with repetitive phrases and picture clues are perfect for the youngest readers. Lascaro's colored-pencil and paper-collage illustrations in Down on the Farm are bright, bold, and thoughtfully placed on each double-page spread. An animal is shown on the left side of the page while a young girl imitates its action on the right side ("I see my duck swim. I can swim like my duck"). With a slightly longer rhyming text and the artist's familiar pen-and-ink and watercolor illustrations, McPhail's humorous book is also right on target. Big Bear is brown but soon changes color as Little Bear accidentally knocks into his ladder while he is painting a tree house blue. After cleaning up, Big Bear returns with green paint and readers are left with a giggle as the next impending disaster is suggested. In both books, the illustrations fill the pages while the text is plain and clearly set in an appropriately large font on a white background. You can't go wrong with adding several copies of these terrific books to your beginning-to-read collection.
Gale W. Sherman, Pocatello Public Library, ID
Copyright 1999 Reed Business Information, Inc.

From Booklist
Every children's librarian spends some time scanning the "Easy Reading" shelves hoping to find a good, funny story for a child just starting to read. McPhail offers just such a tale in this book from the Green Light Reader series. Big Bear grabs a bucket of blue paint and climbs a ladder to reach the tree house he wants to paint. Down below, Little Bear bats a ball that hits Big Bear, who ends up on the ground, covered in blue paint. After washing it off, Big Bear starts to carry a bucket of green paint up the ladder. Down below, Little Bear rides her bicycle into the ladder, causing the loaded paintbrush to go flying. The words are short, the humor is broad, and the delicate ink-and-watercolor illustrations are sure to draw smiles. A winner for the beginner. Carolyn Phelan

From Kirkus Reviews
Big Brown Bear, with a natty bowler hat, is all set to paint the house in this cheerful Level 1 reader. Every page presents a full-color scene and a few words of easily predicted, often rhyming text: ``Bear is big. Bear is brown. Bear goes up. He comes down.'' Big Bear climbs a ladder with a pail of blue paint, while nearby, Little Bear plays with a ball and bat``Oh no! Little Bear! Do not do that!'' These are simple words, but sometimes challenging ones, e.g., there are two uses of up, as in climbing the ladder and washing up. The pen-and-ink and watercolor illustrations provide nearly ideal context, while also amplifying the story. The format is attractive and practical, featuring large type on a white background that is placed for easy reading. Beginning readers will be amused by the gentle humor in the book, and feel accomplished to have tackled it themselves. (Picture book. 5-7) -- Copyright ©1999, Kirkus Associates, LP. All rights reserved.