Playing with Shadows

Young readers can learn to make shadow puppets with this Arabic reading book by Elspeth Graham. Step by step, it shows how to create a dog, a duck, a bat and a snail, then gives a short review of each puppet on pages 14 and 15.

The book belongs to Collins Arabic Big Cat, a guided reading series for children aged 3 to 11. The series follows a graded path built from research into how Arabic is taught in nursery and primary schools, so children can grow their reading skills one stage at a time. Books at level 9 are about as demanding as those at level 8, with clear patterns and similar events from one book to the next.

Because the book is designed to be read in order, its text is written so that children can sound out most of the words. Where a topic calls for it, the book borrows layouts from non-fiction, such as signs, labels, captions and diagrams. From level 9 onward, words are separated by spaces, and very common words appear without vowel marks, which helps children get used to how Arabic is printed in everyday texts.