In the first book children must help the Zookeeper name the animals to help them get back in their cages after a monkey stole the keys. You can also purchase the CD where the animals rap, speak or sing their rhymes for you to guess. The CD does have some animals that are not in the book and also doesn’t include all the animals from the story, but it is still fun to have them together! I get the Camel’s song stuck in my head all the time!
The second book is Guess Who Farm. This one is really cute because it is the story of Young McDonald, Old McDonald’s son. He works until he can get a farm of his own, but when the animals show up they refuse to get out of the trailer. So children have to help Mac coax them out by figuring out who they are.
The last book is Guess Who Neighborhood and this is my son’s favorite. It was written to recapture the memories of our own neighborhoods growing up and to help children stretch their vocabulary. In this story, a family is trying to find the perfect house and are driving the broker crazy by always finding something wrong. Finally there is only one house left and it’s in the Guess Who Neighborhood. Both parents believe it’s the perfect house, but they don’t understand the name of the neighborhood, why Guess Who Neighborhood? The broker has the children put on their thinking caps and play the guess who game.
The books are bright and beautifully illustrated. They’re more like a game with a story that the whole family can have fun with. What’s really great is that afterward you can help your child come up with their own animals or neighborhood helpers and keep guessing. This helps them to learn more about rhyming, creative thinking and much more.
Did you know that Guess Who Zoo was created by the spouse of “What to Expect When You’re Expecting” author Arlene Eisenberg! She helped to inspire the stories by always making rhymes for her children and grandchildren with poetry she would find and having them fill in the blanks. This family certainly knows how to help parents through the process of growing children as well as helping us to educate them in humorous and lovely ways.
You can learn more about Guess Who Zoo, watch a video of the Guess Who Zoo Troupe perform live and much more on the website. Make sure to take a moment and connect with them @GuessWhoZoo on Twitter!
