Review: Treasure Hunt for Boys

Treasure Hunt for Boys

by Emma Surrey and Hermione Edwards

Publication date: 2010
Publisher: Priddy Books
ISBN: 978-1-84915-124-5

Summary/Back cover:
Boys can develop counting and sorting skills as they search for the hundreds of hidden things in this engaging, bright and busy Treasure Hunt book.

Review:
This book is fantastic - it's a bit like those I-Spy books that have been around for a while, but a bit more preschool friendly. Each double page has a scene (pirates, jungle, dinosaurs, wizards, outer space, beach, bedroom, medieval, garage, farm), and on each page there is a list of things to search for - the best part for me, is that it's not just finding something, but counting as well. For example, on the pirate page, the reader has to find 1 treasure map, 2 pirate ships, 3 swords, 4 wooden chests, 5 parrots, 6 palm trees, 7 sharks, 8 bones, 9 rings and 10 bottles - in other words, 55 items to find on each double page spread!

It takes a long time to get through this book as a result, so we have been doing one page at a time. We've sometimes counted the items as we've found them, and sometimes counted backwards and done some simple subtraction - 10 bottles total, we've found 2, so now there's 8 to go.

This book is definitely a winner - from a parent/teacher point of view, I love the maths skills involved, as well as other language that can be included - "try checking the left hand side of the picture" "It's in front/behind/beside..." etc. There's no story to go with this book - it's purely a treasure hunt. A large book (27.5cm square) and made with cardboard pages and solid covers, it's a sturdy book that will stand the test of time with rough preschoolers. We've borrowed this from the library, but I think I'll be buying one to add to our bookshelf (or, more likely, it will never make it to the shelf!)

My rating: 4.5 out of 5

Review written by Bronwyn