Where's Toto? / Ou Es Toto? (Let's Read! Books)

by Elizabeth Laird, Martin Ursell (Illustrator), Marie-Terese Bougard (Translator)

This new title in the illustrated Let's Read! language-learning series is a real page-turner! It's a story for kids, written in a bilingual French and English format, which encourages boys and girls who are independent readers in their own language to begin learning a second language. All Let's Read books present original stories of action and adventure geared to young readers' interests. Meanwhile, kids begin to learn a new language, compare it with their own, and start out on a path toward bilingual fluency. As they read, children discover that they don't need to learn every single new word that they encounter in the second language. As unfamiliar words appear and reappear in the story's context, they will pick up meanings effortlessly, just as they pick up and understand new words in their own language. The parallel text, illustrations, and dialogue balloons on every page give kids a child-friendly bridge to reading and speaking in a second language. Let's Read books are available in both French/English and Spanish/English editions.

Genres: France, Spanish Literature

32 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 2009

About the author

Laird was born in New Zealand in 1943, the fourth of five children. Her father was a ship's surgeon; both he and Laird's mother were Scottish. In 1945, Laird and her family returned to Britain and she grew up in South London, where she was educated at Croydon High School.
When she was eighteen, Laird started teaching at a school in Malaysia. She decided to continue her adventurous life, even though she was bitten by a poisonous snake and went down with typhoid.

After attending the university in Bristol, Laird began teaching English in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia. She and a friend would hire mules and go into remote areas in the holidays.

After a while at Edinburgh University, Laird worked in India for a summer. During travel, she met her future husband, David McDowall, who she said was very kind to her when she was airsick on a plane. The couple were married in 1975 and have two sons, Angus and William.

Laird has also visited Iraq and Lebanon. She claims to dislike snakes, porridge and being cold but enjoys very dark chocolate, Mozart, reading and playing the violin in the Iraq Symphony Orchestra.

She currently lives in Richmond, London with her husband.

Reviews

[Sfia Hussain · Rating 3 out of 5]

This book is one from a range of 'lets read' bilingual books for children. This specific book incorporates French and English text.
Susie goes on a circus adventure with freinds- Simon and Julie, she wants to take her dog Toto with her, she then does so. At the circus Toto gets her into all sorts of trouble!

A lovely, colourful book with lots of illustrations on each page. The illustrations include simple words and phrases in speech bubbles,so if children did not understand the word they could use the pictures to help them.

Being a bilingual book it would be a very helpful for children exploring and beginning to learn the French language, and an excellent source for French speaking EAL students. The English and French text is parallel to one another therefore clear to read. Keywords are highlighted to help refresh and reinforce the reader's memory. There are some re-occurring sentences; hence children will start to recognise words or phrases that are re-appearing in the story.Overall a pleasant and useful book.

[Hm · Rating 3 out of 5]

Nice

[Christina]

I read the French version that is listed in the description and is titled ‘Où est Toto?’ the cover of the book in the picture is in Spanish.

[Teango]

A simple short story for beginners of French, nicely illustrated. Not being a big fan of clowns, I did initially have my reservations though...luckily no storm drains and balloons this time. ;)