Randy Thornton

Yet another read along book, this one drawing on the popular Disney movie The Little Mermaid. The story is a pared-down adaptation of the animated movie, with adequate writing and lines of dialogue that are often pulled verbatim from the movie. The illustrations are not stills from the movie, but the art style is very close. The distinguishing feature of the read along series is the accompanying CD, where a narrator reads the story aloud while children are expected to read along in the book. A chime sounds to notify kids when to turn the page. The relationship between audio and visual text and story is the key selling point for my family. My daughters like to listen to stories and I think linking the oral experience to written text is beneficial to beginning readers. For this reason, we are fans of the Disney read along books, and this one does not disappoint.… (more)

I am a fan of this series, and it is not for the writing (which is just mediocre), but for the combination of book and CD that adds another dimension to the reading experience. However, in this particular book, I was just put off by the story itself and it detracted from the audio enjoyment. The book is a retelling of the Tangled short, where Flynn and Rapunzel get married. Since the cartoon actually follows the exploits of Max and Pascal in their slapstick routine of trying to retrieve the wedding rings in time for the ceremony, so does the book. I find the whole narrative boring. To be fair, I also thought the cartoon on the dull side, and a disappointment to the excellent movie that inspired it. Despite the enhancement of the CD, this is probably my least favorite of all the read along books we bought recently.… (more)

I love this book it is my favorite Disney movie. This is a great book it has great pictures, and also it has a CD that goes along with the book so that students can follow along. Some of the words in the book do not match the movie but most of the words do. I would defiantly read this book to my students because this was my favorite Disney story when I was growing up and also I feel that they will love this book because it will teach them how to read because it has a CD that they can use to read along by themselves.… (more)