Richard Scarry's Best Counting Book Ever

by Richard Scarry

Willy Bunny has learned to count-and so will children, by the time they've finished Richard Scarry's fun-filled book.
When Willy's father suggests that he practice counting all the things he sees, he begins with ONE BUNNY (himself) and soon finds more numbers TWO eggs on his daddy's plate, THREE wheels on a tricycle, a FOUR-wheeled wagon with apples for Willy and his friends to share. By the end of the day, Willy's gone all the way up to 100!
Action-packed and featuring Scarry's always-appealing art, this really is the best counting book ever!

Genres: Picture Books, Childrens, Fiction, Mathematics, Counting, Number, Animals

44 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 1975

About the author

RICHARD SCARRY is one of the world's best-loved children's authors EVER! In his extraordinary career, Scarry illustrated over 150 books, many of which have never been out of print. His books have sold over 100 million copies around the world, and are currently published in over twenty languages. No other illustrator has shown such a lively interest in the words and concepts of early childhood. Richard Scarry was posthumously awarded a Lifetime Achievement Award from the Society of Illustrators in 2012.

Reviews

[Luisa Knight]

I love the colorful pictures and that you can count to 100. There are nicely illustrated addition problems too. I don’t know that I’d ever read the “story” that is in the book, but I have walked through the pages and explained adding to Penny.

A good resource to have laying around so it gets looked at often and allows the knowledge to sink in.

Take a sneak peek inside the book and see what we did after reading it: watch my reel!

Ages: 2 - 5

Content Considerations: nothing to note.

**Like my reviews? Then you should follow me! Because I have hundreds more just like this one. With each review, I provide Content Considerations, mentioning any objectionable content I come across so that parents and/or conscientious readers (like me) can determine beforehand whether they want to read a book or not. Content surprises are super annoying, especially when you’re 100+ pages in, so here’s my attempt to help you avoid that!

If you’re considering a book or looking for a new title to read, check out my highly categorized shelves, read my reviews and Friend or Follow me to spiff up your feed with clean, wholesome, living books.

I have an Instagram account that’s pretty bookishly unique too!

[Plch]

I can count just 79 mice instead of 80... where is the 80th mouse?? (is it a problem with my edition?)
>>> my oldest loves this book, thanks to it he has learnt to count up to 100 and to make some basic additions. 4 stars because of some problems with the translation (and because of the missing mouse).

[Vanessa]

I first read this as a kid. Little did I know at the time that I was not only being taught how to count, but how to do simple math at the same time. I always loved Richard Scarry books, but rereading them as an adult and through the librarian lens, I am struck by their genius. Perhaps if all math books had been as fun and simple to understand as this one, I would be better at it!

[Sara Hollar]

We're loving all our Richard Scarry books! This one has a great way of introducing counting to 100, adding, grouping numbers, and skip counting. My kids love finding something funny on every page. Love it!

[Barbara]

Bunnies, cats, pigs, ducks, and even some frogs, abound in this popular, classic counting book. Originally published in 1975, the book will still help youngsters learn to count as they touch the various animals, objects, or vehicles, all of them drawn carefully and with noticeable features such as eyes, clothing or wheels. The book starts with the number one and includes countable images that are crisp and clean. From one all the way through twenty, youngsters will count, followed by thirty, forty, fifty, etc., all the way to one hundred fireflies. Although some readers might find the book dated or its classification of lions into boys and girls and gentlemen and ladies problematic, it still does its job of providing youngsters practice in counting exceptionally well.

[Read Ribbet]

This is a reissue of Richard Scarry's classic counting book. Scarry's animal characters show up as Willy Bunny spends the day counting things in his world. The book starts with counting 1-20 things and switches to counting by 10 to 100. This is a great book to engage young readers in counting activities and mathematical concepts.

[Marissa]

A really fun and engaging beginning math book. It's visuals make addition easy to understand as a concept and there are so many fun and different things to count that it doesn't get boring. Hard to fun a book involving these concepts that it this fun and engaging and broad in coverage.

[Dan Hyer]

My 4 year old kids love this. It is requested night after night.

[Jenna Mills]

Lots of counting. A bit bizarre.

[Diana C. Kobylak]

Informative book that teaches kids about counting in English and Spanish.

[Roger]

What an inspired way to teach numbers and addition. And many of the pictures are just plain funny!

[Brian]

Banger after banger with this guy. He doesn’t miss.

[Dolly]

I had the opportunity to visit with a friend and check out a few boxes of children's books she had kept from her childhood and her son's. The books are quite old and many are out of print, so it was a wonderful chance to revisit with some stories I read when I was young and to discover others I'd never seen before.

[Wendy Unsworth]

When my own children were small they received a Richard Scarry book as a gift. My first thought was that the illustrations were very sketchy and there was so much happening on each page that it would be confusing for a child. How wrong I was! Both my children LOVED this book and others by this author; they were 'read' to death over the years!
I am pleased to see that they are still available, I have several on my shopping list for my grandaughter who loves to count and thinks this book is THE BEST!!!

[Robu-sensei]

Pretty good, but the title exaggerates; I doubt this late Richard Scarry volume ranks any higher than the 27th best counting book ever. It includes numbers all the way to 100, but somehow forgets to teach directly the algorithm for making numbers higher than 20 (i.e., add the number "one" through "nine" to "twenty-", "thirty-", etc.): the aspiring mathematician is left to deduce the rule from the examples.

[Kelly]

Illustrated by the author. Not having read a Richard Scarry book as an adult, I was AMAZED by how much I loved this! It promotes basic counting, addition and subtraction, grouping, counting by twos, fives, and tens, and even multiplication without seeming overwhelming or like it's even about math! The illustrations are intricate and have lots of "hidden" extras. This book seems perfect for reading over and over and over again. I am a "new" Richard Scarry fan for sure.

[Angela]

Great learning tool for basic addition. We really enjoyed the counting and the many many many numbers.

[Gillian]

Lots of fun things to count!

[Pinky]

Count to 100 with the animals from Busytown.

[Kathleen]

More of an addition book than a counting book.

[Michael]

A really fun way to introduce numbers and basic arithmetic to young kids. My two-and-a-half year old loves it.

[The Brothers]

Asher (4yo) is learning his numbers past 10 now and this book is a great help! It's also and excellent introduction to how number add together to make another number.

[Gricel]

Beginning counting, addition, patterns. 3 1/2 and up.

[Angela King]

I appreciated how this book, as readers count to 100, uses fun visuals and subitizing to aid in students conceptual understanding.

Great math book for kindergarten and 1st grade!