100 Days of Cool (MathStart 2)
Kindergarten-Grade 2--Four friends arrive at school on opening day wearing the jazziest of outfits, having heard that their new teacher intends to celebrate "100 days of cool." Although Mrs. Lopez really meant to mark "100 days of school," she challenges the students to continue for an additional 99 days, and the foursome collaborates to generate ideas for lots of silly costumes, playful pranks, and a more serious yet equally "cool" community service project. Despite their classmate Toby's doubts, the friends come up with a daily surprise and a means of marking the way to 100 and the promised party. This simple story focuses on the single concept of counting to 100. A number line divided by tens appears at the top of most pages, and the cheerful illustrations reflect students of all backgrounds and physical abilities. Arbitrary numbers such as 8, 17, and 41 are given equal fanfare with typical number intervals like 5, 10, and 25. While the book offers reliable reinforcement for one-by-one counters, it won't dazzle children who are ready to investigate numbers in groups. Trudy Harris's100 Days of School(Millbrook, 1999) and Elinor Pinczes's perpetually coolOne Hundred Hungry Ants(Houghton, 1993) are more imaginative choices. An additional purchase.--Gloria Koster, West School, New Canaan, CTCopyright &copy; Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.--This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.