Bet You Can't

by Penny Dale

7 3/4" x 10 1/2" - 28 pages - lovely full color illustrations - a delightful story encouraging a child to try to do it - and - they find they can

Genres: Picture Books

28 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1987

About the author

Penny Dale was born in Abbey Road near The Beatles' Studio, but grew up in Ottery St Mary. Her first school was so small that all the children were in one classroom, and even that wasn't full. She drew and made things all the time and her dad showed her how to use a hammer properly, something she's still proud of. She made plasticine models of everything she could think of. When Penny was very small, she found her parents' folios from a time when they both went to life drawing classes in London. She remembers being immensely impressed by their drawing, and even though she was very young, she knew she wanted to draw like that one day. At her junior school she was encouraged to draw pictures to complement written work, and this she loved, though this was not encouraged later on at secondary school, which she found disappointing. However, she still managed to illustrate work in some subjects, like Science (lively diagrams), Geography (coloured-in maps) and even made a lift-the-flap Norman Castle in History.

After secondary school, Penny took a Foundation Course at Bristol, then took a gap year to work with the Arts Workshop in Bath, making props and costumes, acting, and counting the takings on foreign tours. Later she did a Fine Art Degree at Exeter, where she met her husband Bryan. After college she began working for a time at the Northcott Theatre, designing and making costumes and props again, before she and her husband moved to Northumberland to work on renewable energy projects and graphic design. Their daughter Sarah was born in Hexham, and a friendship developed with an artist she met at childbirth classes, which led to shared daughter-minding, making time for painting, drawing and print making. A year later Penny moved down to South Wales, where Bryan took up a lecturing post in design. It was there that she started to write and illustrate children's books.


Today Penny is one of the UK's leading illustrators of children's books. Her books have met with great success: BET YOU CAN'T and ONCE THERE WERE GIANTS were included in the UK SATS booklist for many years. WAKE UP MR B! was commended for the Kate Greenaway Medal 1988. ROSIE'S BABIES (written by Martin Waddell) won the Best Book for Babies award and was also shortlisted for the Kate Greenaway Medal in 1990. NIGHT NIGHT CUDDLY BEAR (also written by Martin Waddell) and TEN IN THE BED both won the Oppenheim Toy Portfolio Award in 2001 and 2002 respectively. JAMIE AND ANGUS (written by Anne Fine) won the BOSTON GLOBE-HORN BOOK Award in 2003. Penny has sold over three million books worldwide and has been published in over twenty languages. Her most recent work includes PRINCESS, PRINCESS, as well as THE BOY ON THE BUS and JAMIE AND ANGUS TOGETHER.

Reviews

[William Cotter]

This is a book about a brother and sister who are tidying up their belongings and putting them in a basket before bedtime. The story centres on the challenges both children set for each other. These challenges are conveyed through betting one another. They bet each other to lift the basket, who is able to tidy up and who can get into the basket.
This would be a good book for children who are beginning to read. It would be an excellent book to reinforce children understanding of letters and sounds, in order to build confidence. This simple text is accompanied by illustrations on each page. Even though the story itself may not be the most interesting it could also be used to convey the importance of responsibility.

[Amal]

This book is about a young girl who is trying to clean up her room because it is bedtime, however, her younger brother who gives her a challenge interrupts her and bets her that she can’t lift up the basket of toys over her head. The girl takes part in the challenge, unaware that she has started a competition with her brother who now keeps challenging her to other stuff.

This is an excellent read for children that are learning to read as the sentences are very short as are the words.

[Miyako R]

Awesome for read-aloud.

[Tarana Begum]

The story revolves around two children a boy and a girl, the girl starts off by tidying up her room and her little comes in and challenges her to pick up the basket up above her head, which then leads to one challenge after another.

I really liked this book because the plot and the layout is very unique. Although there was very little words the illustrations made up for the impact it has. The book not only simple and enjoyable to read and can be targeted at children aged 5-6 years old.

I feel that this book can be used in many ways, for starters it can be used to read to the whole class, which I did so personally and the response was positively effective, gearing the children to think about the challenges outlined and if they are possible challenges for the children to achieve. It can also teach children to try out new challenges and to have more confidence in oneself than trying not to participate because of the feeling of not getting it right. Lastly it can also develop the children’s use of speech bubbles and terms of developing their creative writing skills.

[Sam]

not a lot going on....a VERY basic book....it is a learning to read book. it is written in "bubbles" like a comic strip, so that is interesting. more boring then most learning to read books in my opinion.

[Lana Clifton]

Great book for the emergent reader and a good introduction for contractions. The story follows a brother and sisters playful attempt to clean up before bedtime. Give young readers confidence by offering a simple text that exercises their fluency in recognition of high frequency words.

[Courtney]

My children absolutely adore this book. Reading literature is so important to the development of a child's mind, and I cannot think of thing I would rather do then sit down to read to them in the evenings. Imagination and growth are so vital in those so young.

[Courtney]

My children absolutely adore this book. Reading literature is so important to the development of a child's mind, and I cannot think of thing I would rather do then sit down to read to them in the evenings. Imagination and growth are so vital in those so young.

[Shani]

A charming story about a brother and sister tidying up their toys. The delightful illustrations and simple narrative really make the characters come alive.

[Haelwyn Greene]

Really cute story about pushing each other and helping when needed.