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Chimps Don't Wear Glasses
The team that created the daffy Dogs Don't Wear Sneakers returns with another silly selection of preposterous predicaments for animals. Camels don't sing and pandas don't pole vault--unless, of course, you close your eyes and draw with your mind. Full color.
32 pages, Paperback
First published August 1, 1995
About the author
Laura Joffe Numeroff
108 books1,010 followersLaura Joffe Numeroff is the NYT best-selling author of If You Give a Mouse a Cookie,
What Mommies/Daddies Do Best
and Raising a Hero. She was born in Brooklyn, New York and graduated from Pratt Institute. Laura grew up as the youngest of three girls, surrounded by art, music, and books. An avid animal lover, Laura has always wanted to write a book about service dogs. She now lives in Los Angeles, California.
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 59 reviews
November 2, 2020
This is a super fun book that gets kids to use their imaginations! The illustrations are extremely detailed and help the story come to life. The rhymes and tone of the book is unique and fun to read. I see a lot of potential for teachers to use this book as a jumping board into a lot of exciting class activities and homework assignments.
June 15, 2017
What really caught my eye about this book was the picture of the chipmunk king, haughtily sitting on his thrown and apparently shouting "Off with his head!" at the supplicant lion in front of him. It made me giggle and giggle every time I looked at it. :) Cute book! Fantabulous illustrations.
December 3, 2018
12/1
Fiction
PreK-1st
This super simple but cute book has few words but lots of crazy art! It may only be funny to a 6 year old but its still humorous to all ages. I enjoyed reading through this book again!
Fiction
PreK-1st
This super simple but cute book has few words but lots of crazy art! It may only be funny to a 6 year old but its still humorous to all ages. I enjoyed reading through this book again!
September 29, 2022
This is a book about imagination. It talks about all things that are weird for an animal to do, such as a chimp to wear glasses. In the end though it talks about how if you use your imagination, anything is possible and cool. There is not always exact rules. Just have fun.
June 25, 2025
Saw this in a thrift store and it immediately brought back so many memories of reading it as a child. The pictures/ artwork in it are so fun and vibrant and they really suck you in to each world as if you’re there with the other animals.
A must have for anyone with young children :)
A must have for anyone with young children :)
September 18, 2017
Silly, fun, rhyming book that reads quickly. Best of all were the illustrations. Absolutely incredible. They are detailed and expressive.
September 26, 2017
Funny story using imagination and dreams for kids. I enjoyed the ending.
August 5, 2018
Even though animals don’t normally wear glasses, cook, or read, if you use your imagination you can see them doing these and even more fantastic things.
The illustrations are hilarious.
The illustrations are hilarious.
September 4, 2018
Simple sentences on each page with lots of detailed pictures. Great for getting children’s attention when reading to them.
November 2, 2018
The illustrations in this book are detailed. They tell the story very well. I liked reading this book because it was funny.
January 12, 2019
Chimps don't wear glasses and other animals don't do other things... a silly book about impossible things.
March 25, 2019
This book is all about the wonders of seeing crazy things by using your imagination. Kids will love the funny animal illustrations and the wacky things that the animals do. K-4th
January 16, 2020
An absolutely GOOFY read. Short and sweet sentences: some spreads only had 1 sentence.
April 28, 2020
creative illustrations and thought-provoking sentences help a child use their imagination!
July 29, 2020
Because of Covid book shortage due to closed libraries, we have read this book about 16 times and now I am going to have to hide it.
January 28, 2021
Of all the books in my son's nursery, this is his favorite one to look at. There aren't many words and there isn't much of a story, but the illustrations are insanely cool.
February 17, 2021
Fun and cute. Great for storytime, especially with toddlers.
April 20, 2022
Great for talking about imagination and/ or illustration with students.
August 27, 2022
My kids are now teens but turns out this is one that they remember fondly and loved.
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September 29, 2022I think this book was very funny. Laura loves having animals be the star characters in her books. She does a good job with it and is creative with what the animals don't do in real life.
March 31, 2023
Silly illustrations showing various animals in unexpected situations which makes for an entertaining read to children.
August 2, 2023
We all enjoyed how silly this was, and Kait loved the pandas.
September 20, 2024
I loved all the wild situations up until the ending. What a cheap cop-out.
September 8, 2014
Do chimps wear glasses? “Just close your eyes and open your mind. You might be surprised at what you will find.” (Numeroff). Chimps Don't Wear Sunglasses by Laura Joffe Numeroff is a funny tale about the silly things animals cannot do. Numeroff starts out her book with ridiculous couplets about animals performing what human activities. The author engages the reader by asking the reader to open their mind to image all these hilarious images. The book comes to a close when Numeroff reveals who she is speaking to (a little girl) and tells her that whatever she imagines that its her dream, not anyone else’s. This book will take children back to their wildest imaginations and encourage kids to be creative.
Numeroff’s illustrator, Joe Mathieu, draws the title page like a bizarre scene of animals driving on a freeway. Both Numeroff and Mathieu want to create a wild and funny mood to the story. When I flipped through the book, each page portrays parodies of animals doing human things, like hang gliding horses or square dancing reindeer. Mathieu is famous for making ridiculous pictures in normal situations. For example, Mathieu illustrates a lion begging and bowing down to this tiny tyrant chipmunk king. Not only is that funny, but kids know that would never happen and that’s what makes it so foolish. Mathieu did a phenomenal job perfectly portraying bight and crazy colors to the illustrations. The attention to detail helps kids to picture what a hang gliding horse or a square dancing reindeer would look like! Numeroff keeps the text to a minimal one sentence per illustration. Numeroff also creates rhyming couplets to make a sing song pattern. The picture mostly sums up the story. The whole book is just one huge list of what animals cannot do just for the fun and the humor. Some of the pages look like they go back in time. There’s one picture of a seal flying a kite in colonial times, like what Benjamin Franklin did when he discovered electricity. Another picture portrays a family of otters in the most ridiculous eighties wigs and parachute pants. Also, the date on the pictures say ’86, ’87, ’89, and ’91. I love how this book has such a good message for the reader at the end of the novel. When Numeroff reveals a little girl in the story, her target audience, Numeroff tells her that whatever her imagination takes her, that its her dream and no one else’s. Numeroff supports creativity and bringing out your wildest imagination. This book will cheer up anybody’s day with humor, color, and creation. It sure cheered up mine!
Numeroff’s illustrator, Joe Mathieu, draws the title page like a bizarre scene of animals driving on a freeway. Both Numeroff and Mathieu want to create a wild and funny mood to the story. When I flipped through the book, each page portrays parodies of animals doing human things, like hang gliding horses or square dancing reindeer. Mathieu is famous for making ridiculous pictures in normal situations. For example, Mathieu illustrates a lion begging and bowing down to this tiny tyrant chipmunk king. Not only is that funny, but kids know that would never happen and that’s what makes it so foolish. Mathieu did a phenomenal job perfectly portraying bight and crazy colors to the illustrations. The attention to detail helps kids to picture what a hang gliding horse or a square dancing reindeer would look like! Numeroff keeps the text to a minimal one sentence per illustration. Numeroff also creates rhyming couplets to make a sing song pattern. The picture mostly sums up the story. The whole book is just one huge list of what animals cannot do just for the fun and the humor. Some of the pages look like they go back in time. There’s one picture of a seal flying a kite in colonial times, like what Benjamin Franklin did when he discovered electricity. Another picture portrays a family of otters in the most ridiculous eighties wigs and parachute pants. Also, the date on the pictures say ’86, ’87, ’89, and ’91. I love how this book has such a good message for the reader at the end of the novel. When Numeroff reveals a little girl in the story, her target audience, Numeroff tells her that whatever her imagination takes her, that its her dream and no one else’s. Numeroff supports creativity and bringing out your wildest imagination. This book will cheer up anybody’s day with humor, color, and creation. It sure cheered up mine!
March 20, 2024
The title of this story includes only one character mentioned in the book. All the very unlikely situations are funny with amusing illustrations.
March 26, 2026
Genre: poetry
Grade Level: K - 1st
Such a fun, sweet, charismatic book about funny things animals will never do. I love how at the end it encourages the reader to think of their own rhyme for something a animal might never do, but that is silly. Such a fun books filled to the brim with rhymes.
Grade Level: K - 1st
Such a fun, sweet, charismatic book about funny things animals will never do. I love how at the end it encourages the reader to think of their own rhyme for something a animal might never do, but that is silly. Such a fun books filled to the brim with rhymes.
February 8, 2017
Summary: Chimps Don’t Wear Sunglasses is about imagination and how everyone is different. This book is about imaging animals doing outrageous things that people would do, like cook, read, drive, etc. The reader gets to explore their imagination and dreams with whatever they might be.
Theme: Chimps Don’t Wear Sunglasses is a book about exploring your dreams and imagination.
Personal Response/Recommendation: I would recommend this children’s book, because it is a silly reminder that children need the opportunity to be creative. The illustration was so adorable and intriguing as a reader. You could start a conversation with children about possible and impossible or ask them to create an animal of their own doing something crazy. I loved the ending of the book that quotes, “But tell me what you see. It’s you dream-not mine.” Personally I highly recommend this book, because it takes you back to when you were young and how you thought you could do anything or be anything. It is so important to stimulate your imagination.
Theme: Chimps Don’t Wear Sunglasses is a book about exploring your dreams and imagination.
Personal Response/Recommendation: I would recommend this children’s book, because it is a silly reminder that children need the opportunity to be creative. The illustration was so adorable and intriguing as a reader. You could start a conversation with children about possible and impossible or ask them to create an animal of their own doing something crazy. I loved the ending of the book that quotes, “But tell me what you see. It’s you dream-not mine.” Personally I highly recommend this book, because it takes you back to when you were young and how you thought you could do anything or be anything. It is so important to stimulate your imagination.
March 19, 2013
This book is a story about dreams and imagination and all the crazy things they can come up with together or separately. At first you don't know that this story is about imagination, the author is simply telling you all the things animals typically can not do, but at the end she states that they can do all of those things if we just think they can in our imagination. I think that this book is a good way to show kids the creativity of the mind. The story has a lot of imagination in it and even if it seems silly or fake, creativity is important in the world. It is also a rhyming story, so it can be used to teach rhymes to kids and how rhymes work in story-telling. I really liked the illustrations in this book because they are so complex and intricate and you can tell the illustrator put a lot of work into making the pictures. The facial expressions on each animal is different from all the rest and even little kids can tell what is going on in the scene based on what the animal's face looks like. I think that this is a clever book that would keep little kids entertained for a long time and even I enjoyed looking at the pictures for a while just to see all of the details.
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April 30, 2015Numeroff, L., & Mathieu (19971). New York, New York: Scholastic, Inc.
"Chimps Don’t Wear Glasses" is a hilarious tale about some silly chimps and other animals who do things humans do like drive cars and brush their teeth. Readers will get to explore their imagination in this wild book.As a children story this book is suitable for all ages. The exciting illustrations accompany the stories vivid descriptions of animals doings crazy things. Children are able to explore their imagination and think what it would be like if we really had talking animals in our world. The only weaknesses of this book is that the plot isn't believable making the characters hard to connect to. The story however gives teachers the opportunity to have student explore their imagination my thinking of something wild that doesn't usually happen in our modern times. Students can write what they make up and then draw pictures to present to the class.
"Chimps Don’t Wear Glasses" is a hilarious tale about some silly chimps and other animals who do things humans do like drive cars and brush their teeth. Readers will get to explore their imagination in this wild book.As a children story this book is suitable for all ages. The exciting illustrations accompany the stories vivid descriptions of animals doings crazy things. Children are able to explore their imagination and think what it would be like if we really had talking animals in our world. The only weaknesses of this book is that the plot isn't believable making the characters hard to connect to. The story however gives teachers the opportunity to have student explore their imagination my thinking of something wild that doesn't usually happen in our modern times. Students can write what they make up and then draw pictures to present to the class.
October 29, 2012
Main Characters: Chimps, and all kinds of other animals
POV: Third Person
Setting: All different Outdoors Areas
Summary: This was a picture book about how everyone is different! I Absolutely loved this story. It talked about how you would never find chimps brushing their teeth or ferrets digging holes in the ground. The story talks about all different kinds of animals and rhymes the entire time. This is a poetry picture book that displays the differences amongst animals and humans. The drawings are halarious because they are about different animals doing things that humans would usually be doing.
Classroom Uses / Theme: I would definitely use this in my future classroom. I would relate to themes such as animal vs. human / Impossible vs. Possible / friendship, hard work, etc.
Lexile Level: 1.0
POV: Third Person
Setting: All different Outdoors Areas
Summary: This was a picture book about how everyone is different! I Absolutely loved this story. It talked about how you would never find chimps brushing their teeth or ferrets digging holes in the ground. The story talks about all different kinds of animals and rhymes the entire time. This is a poetry picture book that displays the differences amongst animals and humans. The drawings are halarious because they are about different animals doing things that humans would usually be doing.
Classroom Uses / Theme: I would definitely use this in my future classroom. I would relate to themes such as animal vs. human / Impossible vs. Possible / friendship, hard work, etc.
Lexile Level: 1.0
Displaying 1 - 30 of 59 reviews