Elementary
A Look at Minerals
A surprisingly interesting (and fairly in-depth) picture book that introduces children to minerals - which include metals and gems. Many full color photos highlight and enhance the text, which covers topics such as Mohs' Scale of Mineral Hardness, ice crystals, cleavage planes (the way minerals break when cut) of various minerals, metals in their natural state, special metals like gold, silver and platinum, how various minerals form and what they look like in their natural state. My children and I found this to be quite an interesting book.
Elephant Families
This book focuses on elephant's care for and interaction with each other with a significant emphasis on elephants being killed by poachers.
Unlike the interesting scientific information designed to impart facts and help children develop an interest in science (as I've come to expect from the Let's Read-and-Find-Out Science Series) this book gets lost in the mediocrity of environmentalism by giving children a sort of emotional attachment to elephants (by over-emphasizing their slight similarities with people) and shocking them with details about how and why people kill elephants and a somewhat
Sharks
Seymour Simon is well-known for his numerous photo-essay-type of picture books for elementary-aged students. Most of his books center around one specific well-defined topic and are illustrated with full-page photographs of the subject. This book is no exception. Sharks is an unpaginated, 32-page picture book, with approximately half of those pages containing full-color photographs of sharks.
Birds do the Strangest Things
Twenty-two stories of the natural but strange and fascinating behavior of various birds. The text covers ostriches, hummingbirds, kiwis, loons, peacocks, emperor penguins, woodpeckers and much more. The text is somewhat lengthy (approx. 12-20 lines per page), but in fairly large print and at a fairly easy reading level. My children find this book completely fascinating. Part of the "Step-Up" series which includes "Meet George Washington" et al.
Fish do the Strangest Things
An informative and enjoyable collection of stories about some very interesting and remarkable fish - such as the Deep Sea Angler, the Archer Fish, the Lungfish, the Puffer Fish and the Mud-Skipper. Although the illustrations aren't fabulous, this book and others in the series have been real favorites with my children. The stories are engaging, fairly short (two to three pages with rather large type) and the content is very appealing.
Falcons Nest on Skyscrapers
This is a very interesting book (with excellent illustrations) that introduces young children to various falcons living in the United States, some of their remarkable abilities and the story of how some scientists were successful in re-introducing the peregrine falcon in the Eastern United States after they nearly became extinct because of an insect spray called DDT which was used on crops earlier this century. The story focuses on Scarlett, a peregrine falcon who was born in captivity, released, and discovered building a nest thirty-three stories up on the ledge of a skyscraper in Baltimore.