View source for Ant and Bee by Angela Banner

{{infobox2
|title=Ant and Bee
|author=Angela Banner
|reviewer=Sue Magee
|genre=For Sharing
|summary=It's the painless and fun way to learn to read and highly recommended - and not just by Bookbag.
|rating=4
|buy=Yes
|borrow=Yes
|pages=110
|publisher=Egmont
|date=February 2013
|isbn=978-1405266710
|aznuk=1405266716
|aznus=1405266716
|cover=1405266716  
}}

When you learn to read it has to be fun.  You have to master the skill but it mustn't be ''too'' daunting or you're ''not'' going to enjoy it and - worst of all - you might be put off reading for life.  It's best if you can share the reading until you get to grips with decoding what's on the page, so if an adult could read most of the words but you read others to which you've already been introduced and which are in a different colour then that is going to be a help.  If the words are introduced with a nice big picture and if they appear in alphabetical order, then that's going to be fun, isn't it?

Meet Ant and Bee, the first in a series of three books which give you all that - and a good story to boot.  This is the first book in the series and introduces three-letter words - ''Ant'', ''Bee'', ''Cup'' and ''Dog'' right through to ''Zoo'' - although I have to say that ''XXX'' for ''kisses'' was just a little bit of a cop-out!  It's all in a hardback cover, so it's pretty sturdy and is a great size for hands which are not used to holding books.  The fonts are clear and the colours are bright.  Once the three-letter words are mastered you can move on to ''More Ant and Bee'' for four-letter words (and a storyline which includes a trip to Asia) and then to [[More and More Ant and Bee by Angela Banner|More and More Ant and Bee]] where you'll meet the five-letter words.

[[:Category:Anthony Horowitz|Anthony Horowitz]] says that these are the books which taught him how to read.  It's forty years since they were first published but they've stood the test of time for a good reason.  They work.  They're user friendly and considerably more encouraging than some of the books I encountered.  Janet and John were not ''exactly'' fun, were they?

I'd like to thank the publishers for sending a copy to the Bookbag.

For more A to Z fun - this time with poetry - we can recommend [[A to Z - The Best Children's Poetry From Agard To Zephaniah by Michael Rosen]].

For more help with learning to read, try [[Bob Books First by Bobby Lynn Maslen and John Maslen]].

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[[Category:Emerging Readers]]