nonfiction – Page 4 – Mom Read It

Intermediate, Middle Grade, Non-fiction, Non-Fiction

National Geographic talks Angry Birds!

Posted on June 11, 2016June 11, 2016 by Rosemary Kiladitis

National Geographic: The Angry Birds Movie-Red’s Big Adventure, by Christy Ullrich Barcus (Apr. 2016, National Geographic Children’s Books), $14.99, ISBN: 978-1426216848

Recommended for ages 8-12

The Angry Birds have arrived on the big screen, and NatGeo Kids is there to celebrate with the release of their twelfth and latest Angry Birds title, Red’s Big Adventure. The book, set in the world of the Angry Birds movie, is set up in four levels: Bird Island, Bird Village, The Search for Mighty Eagle, and Beyond the Island, readers are introduced (or, really, familiarized with – they likely know most of these birds already) to the Angry Birds: Red, Matilda, Chuck, Bomb, Terence, Judge Peckinpah and Cyrus, the Mighty Eagle, and that rascally pig, Leonard. Each character gets a spotlight and a bio, and Red’s adventure is a thread that runs through the course of the book.

What we also get are breathtaking pictures and facts on the animals and plants, the environments and natural wonders of the world’s islands, from Greenland to Galapagos. Learn how a bird’s beak is better than a Swiss Army knife in terms of multi-purpose use: it’s a weapon, a utensil, a mating signal, and a sensory organ. Learn about mountain ranges and how glaciers are formed; learn to create maps or navigate using the stars, like our forefathers did. Find out about some of the biggest animal migrations in history, or discover an island inhabited by pigs (is that were Leonard and his friends came from?)!

I love the NatGeo books. They have the perfect combination of fun and learning, whether it’s their handy, schoolbag-sized fun facts books, like the Angry Birds and the Weird But True books, their sticker books (my living room coffee table currently has all the Dino Sticker Activity book stickers on them, like it’s a mini-Jurassic Park), the First Big Books, or their atlases and almanacs. The photos are incredible, and the information is easily digestible and exciting in its presentation. My kids love them, and the kids at my library go berserk for them. I celebrated the Angry Birds movie release with an Angry Birds Treasure Hunt around the children’s room, where they had to locate different pictures of the birds and pig for a prize. I honestly wasn’t sure how it was going to go over: were younger kids that into Angry Birds anymore? The answer was a resounding YES. About 30 kids took part in the treasure hunt, ensuring that this book and the 11 other NatGeo Angry Birds books will be in my next ordering cart.

Add to collections where nature books and Angry Birds are popular. You’ll be happy you did!

Non-Fiction, Non-Fiction

Get Smart About Sharks!

Posted on June 1, 2016May 16, 2016 by Rosemary Kiladitis

Smart About Sharks, by Owen Davey (Aug. 2016, Nobrow Ltd), $19.95, ISBN: 9781909263918

Recommended for ages 5-10

Kids love sharks. Owen Davey’s Smart About Sharks is going to jump off the shelves and demand to go home with these kids. What’s not to love? There are great infographics giving out wild information (wait until you see all the different kinds of teeth found in sharks across the world), bright, brilliant artwork with a retro feel to it, and tons of facts about sharks, including a debunking of their status as maneaters: if you’re on a surfboard, you look like a seal, and the book has the artwork to prove it.

I love Nobrow/Flying Eye books. They produce beautiful art books that appeal to kids. They manage to find amazing authors and illustrators who know how to attract a reader’s attention and provide facts in a way that is exciting, interesting, and fun. I’ll add this to my nonfiction collection, and I’m buying one for my own home. My 3 year old can’t get enough of this book, and can tell me which shark is a basking shark, and that a megalodon tooth is as big as a person’s head. No, he didn’t read that by himself, but he remembers it every time he sees the basking shark picture, and the infographic that shows the sizes of a great white shark and human being in proportion to a megalodon. Like I said: kids love sharks, and this book knows it.

Add this to collections where animal books are popular.

History, Intermediate, Middle Grade, Non-fiction, Non-Fiction, Tween Reads

Titanic survivor stories: 10 True Tales

Posted on April 20, 2016 by Rosemary Kiladitis

Titanic: Young Survivors (10 True Tales), by Allan Zullo, (Dec. 2015, Scholastic), $5.99, ISBN: 9780545818391

Recommended for ages 10-12

Another solid addition to the 10 True Tales series, Allan Zullo researched survivor stories of the kids who survived the Titanic sinking and told their stories. With heartbreaking statistics – only 86 of about 195 young people under age 17 survived – and tear-jerking stories of children saying goodbye to their fathers as they were lowered into lifeboats, these stories are tough to read, but create an emotional link between readers and the kids who survived the tragic sinking of the luxury liner over 100 years ago. It’s a good additional book to add to nonfiction collections; one that will go beyond the facts and straight to the heart of the people and what they lost. Each story includes a brief epilogue that details what happened to the survivors after arriving back in New York, and any information about the recovery of the survivor’s family members.

If Allan Zullo’s name is on it, I buy it. He’s written over 100 nonfiction books for kids, and knows how to write series nonfiction that reads like page-turning fiction. He knows the subject matter that kids like to read about, from war heroes to surviving sharks, and he makes sure to get a kids’-eye view with books like Kid Pirates and Teens at War. He puts the real face of history into nonfiction text by telling the stories of people affected by world-shattering events.

The book includes a glossary, and Zullo mentions several reliable Web resources, including Encyclopedia Titanica, Titanic-Titanic, and the Titanic Inquiry Project.

Allan Zullo’s author webpage offers more information about his books and an FAQ that features questions kids have asked him.

Graphic Novels, Middle Grade, Non-Fiction, Non-fiction, Tween Reads

First Second brings you Science Comics!

Posted on March 23, 2016March 23, 2016 by Rosemary Kiladitis

First Second’s got a line of Science Comics coming to stores beginning in May with the releases of Coral Reefs and Dinosaurs. The books are beautifully illustrated and bring nonfiction to the next level with information, wit, and fun for readers.

Coral Reefs, by Maris Wicks ($9.99, ISBN: 9781626721456) introduces readers to the world of coral reefs! With an adorable fish acting as emcee and guide, readers get a look at the biology of coral, the different types of reefs, sea creatures that live in and around the reefs, and the ecological importance that the reefs play in our world. Maris Wicks, who also gave us the brilliant and informative Human Body Theater last year, is back with her combination of smart and funny writing and eye-catching, bright art.

The science is solid and there are tons of take-away facts for kids and adults alike. Did you know that some reefs take millions of years to grow? That coral reefs are home to a quarter of all the animals found in the ocean? Wicks also discusses climate change and its impact on the environment, with emphasis ramifications like coral bleaching and ocean acidification. Anyone can help in any way; Wicks provides examples that include reducing carbon emissions (take a walk! carpool! bike ride!); reusing and recycling plastics; composting, and planting trees and flowers. There’s a great message about environmentalism and conservation to be told here, and Wicks ends on an upbeat note: “Caring for ourselves and our environment is the first step to caring for the rest of the world.” With a foreword from Randi Rotjan, Ph.D., Associate Research Scientist with the New England Aquarium, a glossary, bibliography, and additional resources, Science Comics: Coral Reefs is a great companion to any unit on the oceans, sea life, conservation, and ecology. Strongly recommended for public, school and home collections.

Check out Maris Wicks’ website for fiction and nonfiction artwork!

Science Comics: Dinosaurs, by award-winning author MK Reed and illustrated by Joe Flood ($9.99, ISBN: 9781626721432) takes an omniscient narrator approach, walking readers through the history of paleontology, including the many rivalries between scientists that led, in some cases, to some major classification errors, like the poor Brontosaurus, a victim of the infamous Bone Wars between paleontologists O.C. Marsh and Edward Drinker Cope, whose bitter rivalry and rush to beat one another to publishing led them to create a dinosaur that didn’t really exist – it was later discovered that an Apatosaurus body had a Camarasaurus head stuck onto the skeleton, in a rush to complete the work.

With a series of repeated timelines that show facts that society “definitely knew” at different times, we see how much we’ve really learned about the true age of the earth, the fossil record, and the origins of dinosaurs themselves. Joe Flood’s art is less cartoony than Maris Wicks, but captures the tremendous scale and brightly colored dinosaurs that we now understand roamed the earth. There are some incredible graphs and charts in here, illustrating common ancestors and evolutions. A foreword by Leonard Finkelman, Ph.D., Associate Professor in Philosophy of Science at Linfield College, plus a glossary, additional charts, and further resources make this a must-have for any dinosaur collection. Buy two – you know kids love their dinosaurs.

So much more than simple graphic novels, Science Comics is a series that deserves a place in any nonfiction section AND any graphic novel section. The next book in the series, Volcanoes, is due out in October. Recommended for ages 8 and up.

MK Reed’s author webpage has more information about the author and her books, including a link to her anthology on women gamers, Chainmail Bikini.

Sneak peek at Coral Reefs:

Sneak peek at Dinosaurs:

Intermediate, Non-Fiction

Pretty in Pink? Pink is for Blobfish takes a look at pink animals

Posted on February 11, 2016February 11, 2016 by Rosemary Kiladitis

Pink is for Blobfish, by Jess Keating/Illustrated by David DeGrand (Feb. 2016, Knopf Books for Young Readers), $16.99, ISBN: 9780553512274

Recommended for ages 5-8

Pink is for princesses, sparkles, and all things girly and pretty. Right? Um… maybe not. Have you ever seen a blobfish? It was voted the ugliest animal in the world by the Ugly Animal Preservation Society (yes, it’s really a thing) and it’s pink. So very pink. But that’s not the only pink animal! Pink is for Blobfish introduces readers to animals who are all perfectly pink – but you probably won’t find a princess in the bunch.

The first book in zoologist Jess Keating’s “World of Weird Animals” series, Pink is for Blobfish offers brightly colored pages with photos, facts, and hilarious and commentary, plus illustrations by David DeGrand, that kids are going to love. You know those Weird But True NatGeo books? I can’t keep those on the shelves at my library. Kids love weird stuff, they love animal books, and let’s be honest – everyone is tired of writing reports about bears, snakes, and frogs when their animal reports are due.

There’s no way this book will go unnoticed on your shelf. Add to that the original, outright freaky looking animals with solid facts written by a zoologist and kids’ author, and you’ve got your kids’ science reports wrapped up this year. I’m also looking at incorporating this into a Discovery Club we’re working on at my library (more posts on that when I get it underway), because who wouldn’t love a weird animal program?

Check out Jess Keating’s author webpage, where you can sign up to receive her Creature Newsletters and find out more about her #KeatingCreature Twitter feature!

Early Reader, Non-Fiction

Follow a penguin chick’s daily adventures One Day on Our Blue Planet… in the Anarctic

Posted on February 1, 2016August 24, 2019 by Rosemary Kiladitis

One Day On Our Blue Planet… In the Antarctic, by Ella Bailey (April 2016, Nobrow), $16.95, ISBN: 9781909263673

Recommended for ages 3-7

Join an Adélie penguin chick as she gets breakfast from her mother and heads out into the giant world on her own! We see her jump into the water and swim, searching for food, encountering whales and seals, and making sure to avoid becoming someone else’s dinner! Along the way, readers learn about how penguins like our little Adélie friend will travel for years before returning to solid land, how penguin bodies develop to keep warm, what they eat, and meet other types of penguins and sea animals.

Adorable, child-friendly, cartoony illustrations introduce us to all sorts of sea life, including a warty squid porpoise, Antarctic krill, leopard seal, and humpback whale. This is a fun introduction to the Antarctic for young audiences, with an animal kids already love: Penguins! Books like this help turn kids on to nonfiction – pair it with some Salina Yoon for a great penguin storytime, or have a nature read-aloud by pairing with the first book in the series, One Day On Our Blue Planet… In the Savannah.

Ella Bailey is an illustrator and writer. You can see more of her illustrations at Ohh Deer, and you can see some more art from One Day On Our Blue Planet… In the Antarctic right here.

geek culture, Graphic Novels, Teen, Tween Reads, Young Adult/New Adult

YALSA releases their 2016 list of great graphic novels!

Posted on January 29, 2016 by Rosemary Kiladitis

Great news! Last week, YALSA (Young Adult Library Services Association) published their 2016 Great Graphic Novels for Teens list. There are some brilliant titles on the list, making gift purchases and library collection updates a lot easier, by the way. I was really excited to see so many great books on the list, from a diverse mix of major publishers and smaller independents.

Some highlights:

Child Soldier: When Boys and Girls Are Used in War. By Michel Chikwanine & Jessica Dee Humphreys/Illus. by Claudia Davila. Kids Can Press, $18.95, (9781771381260). A young man tells the story of his kidnapping by rebel militants and his time as a child soldier in the Congo.

Doomboy. By Tony Sandoval. Illustrated by the author. Magnetic Press, $24.99, (9780991332472). A teen with an active imagination and a love of heavy metal mourns his girlfriend the best way he can: through his music.

Hellboy and the B.P.R.D.: 1952. By Mike Mignola and John Arcudi. Illustrated by Alex Maleev. Dark Horse Books, paper, $19.99 (9781616556600). Hellboy goes on his first mission.

Human Body Theatre. By Maris Wicks. Illustrated by the author. First Second, $14.99, (9781596439290). A skeleton teaches the reader about the human body and its functions.

Last of the Sandwalkers. By Jay Hosler. Illustrated by the author. First Second, $16.99, (9781626720244). A tribe of insects goes on a voyage of discovery to explore the land beyond their borders.

Princess Ugg, vol. 1. By Ted Naifeh. Illus by the author. Oni Press, paper, $15.99, (9781620101780). Warrior Princess Ulga attends the prestigious Princess Academy at her dead mother’s request.

Roller Girl. By Victoria Jamieson. Illustrated by the author. Dial Books for Young Readers, $12.99, (9780803740167). A tween signs up for roller derby camp and learns about herself, friendship, and sacrifice.

The Scarlet Letter. By Nathaniel Hawthorne, Crystal Chan, and Stacy King. Illus by SunNeko Lee. Udon Entertainment, hardcover, $24.99, (9781927925348). A manga retelling of the classic story of a Puritan woman caught in adultery and forced to publicly bear her shame.

The Suspended Castle: A Philemon Adventure. By Fred. Illus by the author. TOON Graphics, hardcover, $16.95, (9781935179863). Bartholomew has been rescued from an alternate dimension but now misses it and wants to go back, little suspecting the adventure in store for him and Philemon.

Now, go forth and read graphic novels, and check out the rest of YALSA’s list!

Non-Fiction, Uncategorized

Hands-On Science and Math makes learning fun!

Posted on November 19, 2015 by Rosemary Kiladitis

Hands-On Science and Math – Fun, Fascinating Activities for Young Children, by Beth R. Davis (July 2015, Gryphon House), $14.95, ISBN: 9780876596500

Recommended for educators and parents of preschoolers-age 8

I’m always on the lookout for books that have fun, easy activities for my younger patrons. Being a librarian in an urban, lower community made up largely of working class and working poor families, I’ve got a lot of parents concerned about their kids’ progress in math and science. One thing I’ve been working on putting together is a series of science workshops for my younger patrons. I’m a bit clueless in this area, so I’ve been getting some help from my colleague at our Children’s Library and Discovery Center in Jamaica (seriously, go to this library and prepare to be amazed); I also keep an eye out for blogs, websites, and books that offer some ideas. Hands-On Science and Math is one of those books.

Loaded with experiments and ideas for kids from preschool to roughly third grade (you can skew older or younger, with easy tweaks on these experiments), Hands-On Science and Math gets kids thinking and using their five senses to explore the world around them. Each experiment comes with an explanation of the scientific concepts behind the experiment, STEM lessons to be gained from the experiments, and ways to link to the math and literacy in each one. I’ve already created a few sessions for the kids in my library, including using a Matchbox car, cardboard, a pile of books, and a measuring stick to learn about simple machines; examining the world around them using a magnifying glass, and the almighty baking soda volcano (I’ll be doing that one solo, but I’ll give them instructions they can try at home). I’ll be trying these out over the winter break!

Parents and educators can recreate these experiments on a small budget: most of the ingredients and objects can be found at dollar stores or are already in your home. There’s an appendix on graphing topics, a popular math and literacy link here, including questions with concrete answers you can use to graph results. Further resources are available for anyone who wants to read more about STEM activities and young children.

Author Beth R. Davis, EdS, NBCT, holds a bachelor’s degree in elementary education; a master’s degree in teaching English to speakers of other languages, or TESOL; and an education specialist degree in computer education. She is the director of Kids 4 Kids Academy preschool in Miami, Florida. I’m thrilled that she’s got experience in working with speakers of other languages; this talent comes through in her experimentation, and allows me to create these programs with my multicultural families. She offers more science activities for kids on her website, where you can also sign up to join her mailing list.

Non-fiction

Add Make: Paper Inventions to your Maker Library!

Posted on November 12, 2015 by Rosemary Kiladitis

Make: Paper Inventions: Machines that Move, Drawings that Light Up, and Wearables and Structures You Can Cut, Fold, and Roll, by Kathy Ceceri (Sept. 2015, Maker Media, Inc.), $19.99, ISBN: 9781457187520

Recommended for ages 5+ (with some help!)

I love maker spaces in the library. I had a small one at my last library, and I’m psyched to set one up here in my new digs. The kids love having projects to do, and you don’t need a huge area with 3-D printers chugging along to be a maker. Duct tape, construction paper and imagination are a great start. Make Magazine has been a great resource for years, as is their Maker Camp, a virtual summer and holiday “camp” that provides cool projects and a discussion space for anyone who wants in. The Maker Media books are a huge help for anyone – parent, educator, and kid – who needs some ideas on how to stir up some creative juices.

One of the latest books in the series, Make: Paper Inventions is for anyone interested in paper crafting, paper engineering, and paper technology. Offering projects for relative newbies or whose skill level is “mostly thumbs” all the way up to creating paper-based automatons, light-up cards, even a geodesic dome!

Make: Paper Inventions, like every Maker Media book, wants to educate you as well as entertain you, so you’ll find a wealth of information on the nuts and bolts, the science and math, behind paper engineering. You’ll read about paper structures, for instance, and why folded paper can hold greater weights than a plain piece of paper. You’ll also learn why paper will tear rather than stretch if you pull it, but it will bend nicely for a pencil.

There are tons of projects in here for anyone and everyone, in any space. Kids can have a blast making their own paper – their own edible paper, even – with relative ease. Like most maker movements, the Maker Media books are big on reusing, reducing, and recycling, so projects are here for all weights of paper, from rice paper to card stock, and you can use old notebooks, newspapers, or copy paper for many of these projects. There are comprehensive materials lists and step-by-step instructions and photos for every design, and math and science concepts that you can discuss with kids will make teachers happy, and make kids realize that yes, you will use that math outside of math class, and for cool stuff, to boot. An appendix with project templates and an index round out this resource.

I can’t wait to get the kids here at my library paper quilling – it’s one of the easier projects in here that will appeal to my library group’s need for fairly instant gratification. There’s a wealth of Pinterest resources, too, which makes me really happy, because this is likely to be a program I’ll repeat. Paper circuitry looks fantastic, and who knows? Maybe that’s a project for Valentine’s Day – once I get some practice time in.

Check out some of the photos from Make: Paper Inventions, and then add this to your reference library or your crafting library. Get those makerspaces operating!

Middle Grade, Middle School, Non-fiction

What’s Up in the Amazon Rainforest?

Posted on October 30, 2015 by Rosemary Kiladitis

What’s Up in the Amazon Rainforest?, by Ginjer L. Clarke (Sept. 2015, Grosset & Dunlap), $8.99, ISBN: 9780448481036

Recommended for ages 8-12

I’ve been doing a lot of weeding in my new library spot, and the first section I hit was the Animals section. Naturally, I need some new books to fill in my shelves, and this beauty fits the bill. It’s a new geography series, loaded with color photos and a fold-out map, and it’s laid out like a dossier file, with photos sharing space with informative text, laid over maps in the background, and little touches like circled paragraphs and paper clips to give the feeling that kids are reading an environmentalist’s journal.

There’s a ton of information packed into this book: Ginjer Clarke looks at each layer of the rainforest, the flora and fauna that can be found there, and moves on to provide quick profiles on the people that live in the rainforest, products that come from the rainforest (yay, coffee and chocolate!), and most importantly, the importance of conservation and preservation. A bibliography and index round out the book. I’d love to see a glossary and some websites for kids included in future editions – admittedly, I’m working from a galley of the book, so if any of these resources are included in the finished copy, I apologize! In the meantime, her blog offers really cool updates and photos of different places she visits while researching her books. (Wait until you see the size of the oarfish.)

You’ll learn about pink dolphins – who knew there were dolphins in the rainforest? – and howler monkeys, Kapok and cacao trees. Fold-out maps will let kids place themselves in the locations they’re reading about.

Author Ginjer L. Clarke writes popular nonfiction books for kids. She’s got a section dedicated to her Baby Animals series on her website, and sections with more information about her other series, including more of her What’s Up, Out, and Wild Animals series.

Check out some more of What’s Up in the Amazon Rainforest below. The pictures are unbelievable!