Ten Spooky Skeletons is a fun Halloween counting book for little people which, despite the word spooky in the title, is not spooky or scary at all!
The Story: A lonely skeleton sets out to look for some friends and on each page he finds one more until he has nine friends to play with. At the end of the book the skeletons enjoy a party until one of them turns off the light and… (we won’t spoil the end!)
Ten Spooky Skeletons is a sturdy hardback with ten, tactile, glow-in-the-dark skeletons on the cover, it’s lovely to stroke! We love the way that the skeletons are doing a range of familiar activities including reading and eating as well as being pirates, circus entertainers, magicians and ice skaters. Animal skeletons are also included, I love the mouse skeleton, especially when he dresses up in the circus, and my daughter’s favourite is the skeleton owl.
The rhyming text bounces along and is easy to read. The illustrations are fun and full of energy and detail, each one includes a number which correlates with the number of skeletons on the page so it’s fun to look for each number to practise number recognition. Each double spread also has a hole cut out on the right hand side which offers a glimpse of the next page in the story, it’s a lovely invitation for a child to turn the page to discover what the skeletons will do next.
This would be a fun book to read in an early years classroom at Halloween and children could make their own skeleton puppets using this template from Preschool Activities.
For those of you looking for a Halloween book that won’t scare your child Ten Spooky Skeletons is perfect. Pumpkins, bats and spiders are shown in some of the illustrations but the skeletons have fun throughout the book, they’re even smiling on the final double spread which is a fantastic glow-in-the-dark illustration.
Age Range: 3 +
Authors: Patricia Hegarty & Annette Rusling / Illustrator: Garry Parsons
Thank you to Little Tiger Press for sending us a copy of Ten Spooky Skeletons, it’s a fun and original way to practise counting and number recognition.
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