Norman Speak!

Norman Speak!

Author: Caroline Adderson

Illustration: Qin Leng

Genre: Realistic Fiction

Grade Level: Pre-K to 3^rd grade

Have you ever if your dog could speak, what will it say? And ever wonder if your dog understands what you are saying? What if your dog could only understand Chinese? So that means your dog will probably talk to you in Chinese… This story is just that. Norman is a stray dog that gets adopted by a sweet boy and his family. The little boy tries his best to teach Norman basic commands like come, sit, shake but all Norman does is tilt his head. He does make the family happy when he does his little “hula-stump-wiggle-wag” dance. The family first think that Norman is not that smart but when he follows all the command from a guy who speaks Chinese. The little boy realizes that Norman is not stupid but just learning to get used to a new language. A smart bilingual dog in making. So, to make life easier for Norman, the boy and his family take a Chinese class every Saturday morning. The boy manages to learn some basic commands in Chinese but as soon as he sees Norman, he quickly forgets. In the end, all that matters to the little boy is that Norman is happy, and he loves him unconditionally.

The illustration on this book is amazing. The characters are cartoon-like and it is illustrated through the reader's perspectives. Some of the pages, the words are on the right and the illustration is on the left. While some of the pages are all taken over by the illustration. The words have pinyin feature which is a plus for learning some basic Chinese words!

Thoughts:

This was a surprise book for me. I did not realize that there was some pinyin (Chinese) words feature in this book. It is like 2 in 1 book for readers who are trying to learn basic Chinese. I loved this book because the message behind this story is not to give up on your pets and to love them unconditionally. The young boy determination to learn Chinese just so he could make life easier for his dog was just sweet and remarkable. This book would be perfect to read aloud to children as it might encourage them to learn a new language other than English. The boy’s determination also teaches children to do something for the ones that they love. It could be learning a new language or something easy just to make life easier for both parties! An excellent book!