Book Review of the SPEAK! Book Set
Sponsored* | All opinions are our own
The Children’s Book Review
What to Expect: Interactive, Educational, Developmental, Sensory-Based, and Social-Emotional.
The SPEAK! book set cleverly uses hands-on elements, storytelling, and child-centered engagement to help young learners develop language, emotional, and social skills.
Developing essential communication and emotional awareness skills can be challenging for young children. Sometimes, expressing emotions feels overwhelming; children struggle to find the right words or actions. Sometimes, even when they understand basic concepts, putting them into practice can be tricky. How do they learn to say “please”? How can they understand different feelings? How do they connect body parts with actions?
Fortunately, this innovative book set offers engaging, tactile ways to learn these fundamental skills. From QR code-enabled musical videos that encourage animal sound mimicry to mirrors that help children practice expressing emotions, the SPEAK! series provides the tools needed to make learning not just natural, but also fun and exciting for young learners.
The five books in the series—Cake, PLEASE!; Let’s GO!; Maestro’s Musical Friends; Know Your Parts; and Sweet Feelings—focus on different aspects of early childhood development, teaching readers through physical interaction and repetitive practice. The sturdy board book construction ensures durability, providing parents, educators, and caregivers with confidence in their investment, while interactive elements like removable pieces, fold-out pages, and mirrors keep young learners engaged.
Each book in the series serves a unique developmental purpose while maintaining the collection’s interactive spirit. Cake, PLEASE! combines manners with pretend baking, allowing children to practice polite requests while engaging in a favorite imaginative activity. Let’s GO! takes movement education a step further by incorporating safety awareness into its unfolding adventure. Maestro’s Musical Friends creates a multi-sensory experience where children explore animal sounds through both traditional storytelling and modern technology via a QR-enabled video. Know Your Parts makes body awareness engaging through playful animal interactions, while Sweet Feelings transforms emotional learning into a personal journey with its clever use of mirrors that encourage children to explore and express their own emotions.
The SPEAK! book set offers an innovative and engaging way for children to develop essential skills while having fun. Perfect for homes, classrooms, therapy settings, and anywhere young children gather to learn, these books transform passive reading into active learning experiences. For fans of educational programming like Daniel Tiger’s Neighborhood, this series provides a tangible way to reinforce important developmental concepts through play-based learning. Highly Recommended!
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About the Author/Illustrator: Kyung Min
“My hope is that we bring smiles to kids’ faces while they’re reading our books.”
A graduate of the University of the Arts with a degree in illustration and design, Kyung’s career originally took him into Product Design. As a Director of Product Design, he led his team’s creative vision and established the standard of output through mentoring, coaching, and problem-solving.
Amidst this amazing work, though, he always knew that he was an illustrator at heart and dreamed of one day illustrating and publishing a book of his own. His desire to chase that dream grew ever stronger after having two lovely daughters he read to every day, and that dream has finally manifested with the development of Zoybooks!
Now, Kyung works as the ambitious and fearless leader of Zoybooks. His previous experiences make him an ideal leader and problem solver, and he strives to create books that children can learn from, engage with, and enjoy. Not only that, but he is passionate about making reading time fun and easy for parents, too, pairing each book with suggested guidance and activities!
About the Author/Illustrator: Johnny Lee
Our second in command and jack-of-all-trades, Johnny, comes to us after 16 years in the consumer product world, working on packaging and displays for MARS Wrigley brands at Thomas J. Paul Inc. He has also dedicated over 20 years to volunteering for children at his home parish.
At Zoybooks, he looks to combine both passions by applying his expertise in design and print production to bring smiles and help young minds grow. His five-year-old daughter keeps him on his toes, both in and out of work, inspiring ideas for content and intent. This is all for you, G!
About the Author/Illustrator: Melody Yoo
“Learning and play should always be together.”
Melody is a former elementary school teacher (8+ years in K-2) with a bachelor’s degree in Early Childhood Education (UD Honors) and a master’s degree in Reading & Literacy (Johns Hopkins). Her job as an illustrator and collaborator at Zoybooks combines two of her greatest loves: art and education! She loves being able to use her teaching experience and knowledge of literacy & child development to help create reading experiences that are more engaging, playful, and interactive than the typical read aloud.
With a love of all things picture books and cartoons herself, Melody hopes to create charming books, characters, and stories that kids and adults with both love! She believes that play empowers both learning and relationship-building.
Dedicated Reviews allow authors and illustrators to gain prompt visibility for their work. This is a sponsored*, non-biased review of the SPEAK! Book Set. Learn more about getting a book review …
