Reviews
Series Made Simple
What exactly does the president do? Engaging text in a bold, colorful layout answers this and many other questions youngsters may have about the inner workings of the U.S. government. The three branches of national government are discussed, explaining their system of checks and balances. View →
Series Made Simple
New readers are the intended audience for these short and simple titles. Most sentences consist of a repeated pronoun plus a verb. The words on three spreads from Deer Fawns, for example, are: “It hides. It eats. It drinks.” The intentionally basic and repetitive language is a good fit… View →
Bookworm for Kids Blog Review of Miranda Lambert
Fans of country music and especially Miranda Lambert gain an interesting glimpse into her background and are inspired to follow their own dreams. Kids ages 4 to 7 who adore Miranda Lambert (or those who want to get to know more about her) will find exactly what they’re looking for… View →
Booklist STARRED Review of Creeping Slime: Slime Molds
Starred Review: The bright yellow, alien-looking globs on the cover of this volume in the Slime-inator & Other Slippery Tricksters series (6 titles) hint at something gross within, and, well, that’s not far off the mark. But slime molds are also seriously cool, and… View →
For the animal lover, Los bebés del bosque series (8 titles), which, in English, translates to Forest Babies, makes an excellent vocabulary primer for the emerging Spanish-language reader. Los zorillos bebés, which stars some surprisingly adorable skunk kits, contains easy Spanish… View →
SLC Review of A Day at the Beach: Animal Life on the Shore
Primary readers will feel like they have spent an exciting day at the beach when they explore the six titles in this colorful, fact-packed series about animal inhabitants at the seashore. Each nonfiction title has a table of contents, index, and Science Words (essentially a mini… View →
Booklist Review of Animals That Fly
The Animals on the Move! series (6 titles) is part of Bearcubs Books, a new imprint dedicated to supporting early literacy skills. This book uses a repetitive Q&A format to support new readers and show off some of the sky’s frequent fliers. A large, vividly colored… View →
Booklist Review of Harvest Mouse
Up-close photos of the tiny harvest mouse do the heavy lifting in this volume in the Wildlife Watchers series (4 titles), aimed at the primary grades. Shown snacking, climbing, snuggling, and scurrying, this adorable rodent will easily attract an eager audience. Newly independent… View →
“Benjamin Franklin instilled the idea of volunteering in the U.S. with the first volunteer fire department. Today, volunteering remains a way for citizens to take part in democracy. This title in the Being an Active Citizen series (5 titles) explains how volunteers give time,… View →
Bookworm for Kids Blog Review of Harvest Mouse
This takes a short glance at the life of a harvest mouse and helps kids to learn the basics of reading along the way. Inside the cover are ‘Tips for Reading Success’ which give parents/readers wonderful ideas on how to lead young listeners and early readers into the pages,… View →
Coding in Transportation
You may not realize how many things rely on code to run these days, and vehicles are no exception. Cars are the stars of this level-2 reader, part of the “Coding Is Everywhere” series (6 titles), which reveals that most modern cars contain more than 24 computers. These computers control… View →
Costumes and Props
Filled with large stills—mostly from recent fantasy franchises, like the Marvel Cinematic Universe, plus glimpses of older classics such as Pirates of the Caribbean (not to mention Roman Holiday and Charlie Chaplin’s The Gold Rush)—this entry in the Movie Magic series (6 titles)… View →