Calvin Goes to School: Bilingual in Cantonese and English (Jyutping)
Written by Karen Yee
Illustrations by Bima Susila and Isabel Nadal
September 9, 2023
28 pp.
ISBN: 9781955188104
Calvin Goes to School is an adorable bilingual children’s book in Cantonese-Chinese and English, with Jyutping (a form romanisation system developed by the Linguistic Society of Hong Kong in 1993). The book follows an adventurous school day of Calvin and his school friends, Dragon and Red Panda. Children will learn Cantonese and English words which relate to the classroom, playground, and the actions taken in these settings. The illustration style of Bima Susila and Isabel Nadal is a precocious one and readers will be visually drawn to the cute, child characters. If one is unfamiliar with bilingual books, the amount of text can be a bit much to process, but luckily, the author Karen Yee made sure that brevity was key, as is common in children’s storybooks. Overall, this would be a useful teaching tool for parents who are native Cantonese speakers who would like to teach their young children English. Conversely, this book would be useful for English-speaking parents seeking to teach their young ones how to speak Cantonese. I particularly find Calvin Goes to School resourceful for any Cantonese-speaking Chinese American parents seeking to impart their language and culture to their little ones.
Note: The illustrations may potentially perpetuate “oriental” stereotypes to some readers, such as the Asian-influenced architecture seen in the book or with the personified animals chosen by the author to be Calvin’s friends. However, as the story is seemingly set in an Asian-influenced world and the characters of Red Panda and Dragon represent important animals in Chinese culture, I understand why Yee (Chinese herself) made these decisions. I still highly recommend this read.
Bonus content: The illustrators included a fun additional game for children, “Find Calvin’s Dinosaur!” Readers may seek Calvin’s yellow gold dinosaur throughout the book. Lastly, a Cantonese audio version of the story is available online through the publisher’s website and on YouTube.
Review by Annie Tang, editing assistance by Molly Higgins.
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