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Title: What Time Is It? by P.D. Eastman ISBN: 0-375-81362-4 Publisher: Random House Books for Young Readers Pub. Date: 26 March, 2002 Format: Board book Volumes: 1 List Price(USD): $7.99

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Average Customer Rating: 3 (1 review)

Rating: 3
Summary: More morality tale than book about time-of-day
Comment: I bought this book to teach my 3-year-old the hours of day, and was attracted by the easy-to-move clock hands. The large clock face is accessible on every page of the book, allowing your little one to move the hands to mimic the small clock showing the time of day for each scene.

Unfortunately, the clock hands are not geared to each other, which would be better, since having them both move freely allows my son to generate some "impossible" configurations. The story itself deals only with whole-hour times, though, so you only need to move the hour hand.

However I do have a small problem with the storyline, which compares the habits of early riser doggie Ted with his roommate Fred. (On the cover each dog sports a sweater with "T" and "F" respectively - "True" and "False"?).

While Ted rises at 8, Fred sleeps in. No problem so far, but for the rest of the book, Ted is engaged in praiseworthy "winning" behavior, while Fred is portrayed as lazy and inferior throughout the entire day, e.g.
- Ted has lifted weights, gone jogging, collected the mail, and vacuumed before Fred has even made the bed.
- Ted beats Fred at tennis.
- Ted runs after a butterfly while "lazy" Fred goes fishing.
- Ted prepares for an early night while Fred watches TV.
- Finally, at least our poor maligned Fred is shown reading a book, while Ted falls asleep.

Now, I am not a morning person (nor is my son; we enjoy our late evenings together when most white American kids are "put to bed"). So I am sensitive - perhaps overly so - to the smug "morning nazis" who crow about how early they start the day. (But by 4pm they are nowhere to be found at work, and forget any social events lasting beyond 8:30pm!).

It's a shame that this book does not treat people's, or dogs', different schedules in a more even-handed way. From this story, children will get the message that the earlier you rise, the "better" a person you are! Some parents may like this agenda, but I do not. So I'll be shopping for another book to teach my son the time, thank you.

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