ARA Review by Cmiller7nm of Having fun with the Animals

[Cmiller7nm]

[Following is an OnlineBookClub.org ARA Review of the book, Having fun with the Animals.]

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4 out of 5 stars

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This children’s book is about a boy who visits a farm for the first time. He is the one who suggests visiting a farm to his mother. He wants to see farm animals and find out what they are like. He is especially interested in discovering what they eat and feeding them. His mother agrees to take him, but when they get to the gate, he is hesitant about going in. He sees some animals and is a little bit afraid. His mother assures him that it is safe, so they enter. He meets goats first and then chickens, pigs, horses, and donkeys. He meets other children who are interested in farm animals too.


Children will enjoy the colorful and fun illustrations The pictures show the farm animals, green grass, and red barns. The little boy has big brown eyes that are full of wonder and excitement. They show he is really enjoying himself as he makes friends with the animals and the other children.

Children who live in large cities and don’t see rolling green pastures or farm animals very often or at all in their daily lives will enjoy this story very much. Parents can read this book to pre-readers and early readers can proudly read this book all by themselves. Children who live in small towns near a farm or on farms themselves may not be as interested in this book though. There are a few illustrations that show all the animals together which might take them by surprise. They would recognize the illustrations of the separate chicken coop, pig pen, and horse pasture more, as the animals are usually separated into their own areas. They would also wonder where the farmers are.


This book receives four out of five stars, mainly because the illustrations and the story action don’t seem to fit the reality of a country farm. The animals are shown together too often, and the farmers are absent. Also, the animal caretakers would not allow children to feed all the animals at any time. Perhaps, in a petting zoo, it might seem like the children can feed them freely, but, if properly managed, the caretakers rotate the animals, so they won’t get overfed or fed the wrong food.

A couple of other changes would improve this children’s book as well: one is a grammatical point and the other has to do with the text matching the illustrations. For English speakers, the title doesn’t sound quite right. It would sound more like English as “Having Fun with Animals.” Lastly, when reading the story, the text refers to the mother from the beginning pages, but she doesn’t appear until the last two. A reader or listener wonders why the mother isn’t in the pictures throughout the book until the end.

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