Manners

The wonderful Aliki Brandenberg has written and illustrated more children's books than many kids have read. (She's got 133 listings right here at Amazon.com.) This time she brings us a paperback version of her 1990 hardcover Manners, a cheery, funny dissertation on how and, more important, why to be a polite child.

A combination of hilarious, colorful illustrations, comic-bookish playlets such as "You Are Interrupting Again, Leon," some of what a grown up might call role-playing, and miscellaneous other gems, the book adds up to the best child's handbook on manners since the Goops showed up at the end of the 19th century.

[Offered for ages 4 and up, but useful to any child, family, or k-3 classroom.]