My First Chinese New Year

by Karen Katz

Hooray! Hooray!
Soon it will be Chinese New Year.
Chinese New Year is a time of new beginnings. Follow one little girl as she learns how to welcome the coming year and experience all the festivities surrounding it.

Genres: Picture Books, Childrens, Family, Holiday, Storytime, Cultural, China

32 pages, Hardcover

First published January 3, 2005

About the author

Karen Katz has written and illustrated many books for children, including The Colors of Us, Can You Say Peace, My First Ramadan, Counting Kisses and Where is Baby's Belly Button. Long inspired by folk art from around the world, she was inspired to write her first book, Over the Moon, when she and her husband adopted their daughter from Guatemala, and she wanted to tell the story of welcoming Lena into their lives. Katz loves to paint and experiment with texture, color, collage and pattern. Besides an author and illustrator, she has been a costume designer, quilt maker, fabric artist and graphic designer. Katz and her family divide their time between New York City and Saugerties, New York.

http://us.macmillan.com/author/karenkatz

Reviews

[⭒Christie ☽✯➳✯☾ · Rating 4 out of 5]

Loved it! Great illustrations and a detail about the new year. Read this one today with my little one at her school.

[Emily · Rating 5 out of 5]

Really great! I appreciate the length and detail. looking forward to taking the girls to a Mexican restaurant on Tuesday to celebrate lunar new year. (well, we live in Morris).

[Lauren · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book takes you along with a young girl who is about to celebrate the Chinese New Year with her family. It talks about many of the customs and traditions that her family does, such as getting new clothing and new hair cuts to have a fresh new year, making an altar to honor their ancestors, and decorating the walls with lots of red paper (red means good luck and happiness in China). I think this is a good book to have in your classroom because it is an easy way to teach young children about some of the customs that come along with the Chinese New Year. If there are students in your class that celebrate this holiday, you can ask them to tell you about what family traditions are unique to their family.

[Mary Little · Rating 3 out of 5]

Brief Review
This fictional story is told by a young girl experiencing her first Chinese New Year. She describes the different traditions and celebrations associated with this event. The illustrations are bright and colorful. I think this is a good choice for introducing youngsters to a different culture.

Content Areas
I could use this as a read-aloud book in a literacy class. The fun, colorful, book would make a great introduction to another culture's holiday. In an art class we could go crazy with this book. After reading it, we could make lanterns, or dragons, or some sort of project that uses the bright colors and designs associated with traditional Chinese culture.

Comprehension Questions
Are there any traditions described in the book that are similar to American traditions? Many of us get new clothes around the new year, many families get together and share big meals around the holidays, we also celebrate the holidays with parades.

What are some traditions described in the book that are specific to the Chinese New Year? Sweeping away bad luck, cutting quince and plum blossoms, eating tangerines and oranges for prosperity and good luck.

Wonders
I wonder how many Chinese americans celebrate the Chinese new year.
I wonder if young children get frightened by the parade dragon.

[Ben Truong · Rating 4 out of 5]

My First Chinese New Year is a children's picture book written and illustrated by Karen Katz. It is a book about an adorable little Asian girl who is exited that Chinese New Year is about to begin and all the customs that she will participate in. Tonight is Chinese New Year's Eve (15 February) so I thought it would be apropos to read this book today.

The text is rather straightforward and well-paced. It is a wonderful book told from the perspective of a little girl who is really excited about Chinese New Year is starting and is excited for the festivities to begin. The illustrations are quite beautiful and very colorful and complement the text rather well.

The premise of the book is rather straightforward. It's about a Chinese girl excited about Chinese New Year. Surprisingly, it is an extremely informative book focusing on the customs that some Chinese family do to welcome the Lunar New Year and more importantly why they do it. I liked that it shows that it takes days even a week of preparation before they could celebrate the New Year's properly with family.

All in all, My First Chinese New Year is a wonderful children's book about a girl's first Chinese New Year and was surprisingly informative.

[Cheryl]

Not as simplistic as one might think from the title. Lots of different customs mentioned.

Different picture-books on the theme have different focuses. This is a straightforward story with fairly generic characters (unlike the imposition in Popo's Lucky Chinese New Year of a relatively complex story) and is very cute.

Reading three of them in the same week reveals to me the insufficiency of all. I cannot particularly recommend any of these three to your library or homeschooling cooperative.

[A Allen · Rating 3 out of 5]

This book follows a young child preparing for Chinese New Year. I liked the simple explanations of the traditions, such as saying "we will start the year all fresh and new" on the clothes and haircut page. I will certainly included this story in my Chinese New Year lesson plans for now. However, the art is not my favorite and I don't even know if Katz celebrates Chinese New Year! I wish the "about the author" section touched on why Chinese New Year is important to Katz.

[Dalya Huerta · Rating 4 out of 5]

This was a really cute book. It explained the many different meanings behind Chinese new year and the different foods they eat and what they represent. They hang up a lot of decorations that represent good luck, they get money in an envelope to wish them luck throughout the year, they have parades with dragons that also represent the new year of good luck and new begging's. It's cool to see different cultures and their backgrounds and seeing an experience that I've had zero knowledge on

[Lauren · Rating 4 out of 5]

A simple introduction for the storytime crowd about how Chinese New Year is celebrated. This book offers some explanations to some of the traditions: why the decorations are red (it symbolizes good luck) and why people get haircuts (to start the new year fresh). A great pick for storytime, although I would prefer an #OwnVoices title.

[Chinook · Rating 4 out of 5]

This was Kait’s choice from the school library and it was a good intro. Since we also have a board book about Chinese New Year, which Maddie actually went and found on her own when we read this one the first time, we were able to compare and contrast the information.

[Dawn · Rating 4 out of 5]

Great way to introduce Chinese New Year to a child

[Jessica · Rating 5 out of 5]

I loved learning about Chinese New Year, and teaching what I learned to my kids.

[Adrianne Rosal · Rating 5 out of 5]

Very cute little book to read to my granddaughter!!

[Erica · Rating 4 out of 5]

Learn how to say Happy New Year in Chinese and what they do to get ready for the new year. Learn about how they wish everyone good luck and what you'll see at the parade.

[DiAnne Warfield · Rating 4 out of 5]

Colt ECEC library story times week of 01-27-2020

[Raizy · Rating 5 out of 5]

Adorable! Kid friendly and clear.

[Suzanne Lorraine Kunz Williams · Rating 4 out of 5]

What a sweet book to learn about different cultures.

[Goshen PL Childrens · Rating 4 out of 5]

Read at Storytime on February 3, 2021
Theme: Chinese New Year

[Sheli · Rating 5 out of 5]

great information and great read aloud for my young students!

[Rainbow Room TOL]

Shelved with Winter

[Liz De Coster · Rating 3 out of 5]

Informative and age appropriate, colorful illustrations.

[Haley Kilgour · Rating 3 out of 5]

A good introduction to Chinese New Year for children. I do think more of the story should’ve been dedicated to the parade though.

[Tera · Rating 2 out of 5]

I meant to read this for my Lunar New Year storytime, but I decided against it. I felt it was a bit dry for reading out loud

[Chloe Litman]

A good book to take students through the aspects of this holiday. Definitely a great read to help students learn and be engaged with the artwork.

[Ashley · Rating 3 out of 5]

In class, the theme this week in Chinese New Year. Even though I really enjoyed this book, the class did not. It was informative but they gave it two thumbs down.

[K Morlando · Rating 4 out of 5]

Loved reading this. we learned so much about chinese new year!

[Becky B · Rating 3 out of 5]

A little girl introduces readers to many of the customs and practices of a traditional Chinese New Year celebration.

This is a great introduction/explanation of many of the traditional practices of a Chinese New Year. It explains the significance of things like oranges, plum blossoms, and dragons in an easy to understand manner. A very nice multicultural picture book for classrooms and libraries. Be sure to read the author's note in the back for a little more info on Chinese New Year.

My one issue with the book is that I'm really not sure why this is called My First Chinese New Year. The girl is obviously more than a year old and seems to be part of a family that is of Chinese heritage so it isn't her first time celebrating the event...it seems a little bit random and I'm not sure why they didn't just leave out the word "first." Small thing, but it struck me as rather odd.

This book may easily be incorporated into lessons about cultural celebrations. And it also easily leads to a discussion about luck, as many of the practices of Chinese New Year revolve around things that are supposed to bring good luck for the coming year.

[Kara Roberts · Rating 3 out of 5]

As the chinese new year falls on a different date every year.
Chinese lunar New Year is commonly known as Chinese New Year or spring festival. This is an important annual festival celebrated by Chinese round the globe. The festival is based on Chinese calendar and starts on the first month (as per the Chinese calendar) and ends on the fifteenth day of the first month. Chinese new year 2012 will be celebrated on 23rd of January and is the year of Dragon, the most auspicious animal as per the Chinese zodiac. This new year features contemporary and traditional Chinese cultural activities, dances, festivities, singing, Chinese opera, arts and crafts, karaoke competition, innumerable stalls of culinary delights.


I could use this when talking about different cultures and the Chinese New Year. I think this book does a good job at describing what Chinese people do to celebrate the New Year. I like the illustrations as well. They make the story even more informational.

[Vivian · Rating 4 out of 5]

If there is time for only one Chinese New Year book this is the one I recommend. The pictures are big and bright, the story features a mother, father, sister, grandpa, and gradma and emphasizes the importance of family. Pre-schoolers can be invited to "act out" the many preparations, such as hanging decorations, sweeping, cooking, etc. One page mentions gifts in little red envelopes.

Finish up story time with parents making origami paper wallets from red paper. Do a web-search for video instructions. Demonstrate to the parents how it is made and assure them you will circulate among them to give help. Provide coloring sheets for the children while parents work on the folding. Provide stickers for the children to apply to the completed wallets. Show how there is a place to put their library card and library book receipt inside.

[Lule · Rating 3 out of 5]

1) No awards received.

2) Appropriate for Kindergarten through 2nd grade.

3) In this story, a family is preparing and celebrating the Chinese New Year. Through illustrations, the story unfolds as the family decorates their home with red; red meaning luck and happiness. Relatives come over to celebrate together and have a grand feast. The children receive gifts such as money in "red" envelopes and continue their celebrations by going to the parade. The parade is full of dancers, lanterns and of course the dragon which symbolizes the comings of spring.

4) The story is information because through illustrations we learn a culture and their traditions. The story is well written and easy to read along. Great for showing diversity.

5)
- Create any form of art to show the class how or what you do to celebrate the New Year.
- Make our own lanterns.