Saving the Countryside: The Story of Beatrix Potter and Peter Rabbit


Linda Elovitz Marshall - 2020
    This is the true story about how she helped save the English countryside!Growing up in London, Beatrix Potter felt the restraints of Victorian times. Girls didn't go to school and weren't expected to work. But she longed to do something important, something that truly mattered. As Beatrix spent her summers in the country and found inspiration in nature, it was through this passion that her creativity flourished. There, she crafted The Tale of Peter Rabbit. She would eventually move to the countryside full-time, but developers sought to change the land. To save it, Beatrix used the money from the success of her books and bought acres and acres of land and farms to prevent the development of the countryside that both she and Peter Rabbit so cherished. Because of her efforts, it's been preserved just as she left it.

Sloths!


William Hartston - 2018
    Thanks largely to YouTube clips posted by the sloth orphanage in Costa Rica, sloths have attracted a vast audience of admirers. Instead of seeing them as ridiculous anachronisms of which we know little, they have turned into creatures considered by many to be the most endearing on earth.Over much the same period, scientific investigations have also changed our view of sloths. No longer are they seen as total misfits in the modern world but, in the words of one specialist sloth investigator, they are 'masters of an alternative lifestyle'.In this wonderfully entertaining celebration of this most unique of creatures, William Hartston reveals the fascinating history of the sloth, from the prehistoric ground sloth to modern pygmy sloths in Panama, explores the current state of the science of sloths and reveals the truth behind sloth behaviour.

Titanosaur: Discovering the World's Largest Dinosaur


José Luis Carballido - 2019
    The final spread will open up into a gatefold showing a photograph of the full Titanosaur skeleton on display at the museum. Chock-full of back matter like a glossary and extra information and photographs from the dig, and an inside jacket poster of the Titanosaur, kids of all ages will devour this book.

Absolutely Everything!: A History of Earth, Dinosaurs, Rulers, Robots and Other Things Too Numerous to Mention


Christopher Lloyd - 2018
    Embark on an entertaining journey across millennia and continents with this captivating book by Christopher Lloyd, author of the bestselling What on Earth Happened. Discover everything from the creation of planet earth and the rise of animals, to globalization, wars and global warming.

An Octopus Is Amazing


Patricia Lauber - 1990
    And if an octopus loses an arm, it will eventually grow another one. Amazing! Read and find out about the many other ways an octopus is amazing. This nonfiction picture book is an excellent choice to share during homeschooling, in particular for children ages 4 to 6. It’s a fun way to learn to read and as a supplement for activity books for children."[Here is] a charming introduction to the truly amazing octopus [from its intelligence to its ability to change colors to the camouflaging black ink it squirts to escape predators]. Lauber's chatty, fact-filled text makes the book a good read-aloud, and Keller's amusing and colorful drawings enhance it—a perfect match of text and illustration." —SLJ.This is a Level 2 Let’s-Read-and-Find-Out Science title, which means the book explores more challenging concepts for children in the primary grades and supports the Common Core Learning Standards, Next Generation Science Standards, and the Science, Technology, Engineering, and Math (STEM) standards. Let’s-Read-and-Find-Out is the winner of the American Association for the Advancement of Science/Subaru Science Books & Films Prize for Outstanding Science Series.

If: A Mind-Bending New Way of Looking at Big Ideas and Numbers


David J. Smith - 2014
    But what if we took these big, hard-to-imagine objects and events and compared them to things we can see, feel and touch? Instantly, we'd see our world in a whole new way." So begins this endlessly intriguing guide to better understanding all those really big ideas and numbers children come across on a regular basis. Author David J. Smith has found clever devices to scale down everything from time lines (the history of Earth compressed into one year), to quantities (all the wealth in the world divided into one hundred coins), to size differences (the planets shown as different types of balls). Accompanying each description is a kid-friendly drawing by illustrator Steve Adams that visually reinforces the concept. By simply reducing everything to human scale, Smith has made the incomprehensible easier to grasp, and therefore more meaningful. The children who just love these kinds of fact-filled, knock-your-socks-off books will want to read this one from cover to cover. It will find the most use, however, as an excellent classroom reference that can be reached for again and again when studying scale and measurement in math, and also for any number of applications in social studies, science and language arts. For those who want to delve a little deeper, Smith has included six suggestions for classroom projects. There is also a full page of resource information at the back of the book.