Kid Lit Saves World

Passport Into the Wild (Jungle Jack Hanna)

If you heard this had become a video blog, you were misinformed. Although I love a good heartwarming YouTube moment as much as the next reader, it's the page-turnin' life for me. So here I go again . . .

Passport into the Wild
Jack Hanna

Ages 8-12
Hardcover, 72 pages
10.5 x 10.4 x 0.7 inches

Thomas Nelson
ISBN: 978-1400311385
Buy the book

Leafing through this log of Jack Hanna's wilderness adventures (winner of the prestigious Mom's Choice Award) it's hard not to get excited to learn about (and protect) the wild places on our globe that few have seen up close. Adding a few twists on the old-school follow the khaki-shirted-explorer-dude-into-the-wild theme, this book includes a passport and photo stickers of animals "seen" on different continents, as well as stickers showing the reader's "travels" through the book, spanning seven continents. The book brings kids along with Jungle Jack Hanna as he reminisces in his travel journal about hiking through stinging nettles in Rwanda, or paddling an inflatable raft through the icy seas of Antarctica to see Gentoo penguins.

The big book offers two-page spreads on each continent, rich with photos tracking the animals and showing some of the people Jungle Jack has met in his real-life exploits. Also included are maps of the continents and (sometimes) their locations on the globe. The layout is peppered with paperclips, pushpins, a set of binoculars and a fountain pen intended to give readers the feeling they are leafing through Jack Hanna's private travelogue.

Children ages 8-12 are the best audience for this book. Kids may notice that (for all its carefully orchestrated stains and weathered edges) this journal looks a bit too neat for one that's traveled around the world. But kids are voracious explorers themselves and aren't likely to object. They'll be far too engaged with the book's enjoyable ruse of taking them on a trip through these wild places on our planet. All in all, a very good homeschooling tool, a fine book for teachers to use on units about these continents and their indigenous peoples and animals. And a great way for parents to engage kids in conversations about these people and animals who live in interesting places.

To get a look at Jack Hanna's Daytime Emmy Award-winning children's TV series, Into the Wild, check out this helpful Show Finder from the Jack Hanna website.

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Ceci Miller is co-publisher of BooktiMookti Press, home of the Runt Farm chapter book series. She is also a children’s author, book editor, and owner of CeciBooks editorial and book publishing consultancy for authors and indie publishers. See some of her book projects here.

Arctic & Antarctic: Kids' Books & Projects

Amazing Arctic & Antarctic Projects You Can Build Yourself
Camella Van Vleet
Illustr. Steven Weinberg

Ages 9 and up
Paperback, 122 pages

Nomad Press
ISBN: 978-1-9346700-8-8
$15.95  Buy the book  

This book is full of hands-on projects to help kids understand the polar regions, their animal and plant life as well as these regions’ importance and its relationship to global warming. Make your own Toboggan with Wheels, Sinking Ice, Sun Goggles – even your own Narwhal Tusk! 

Clearly illustrated projects appear alternately with well-written lessons on subjects such as exploration of the polar region, animals of the tundra, the scientists who work on the poles, and the Inuit people. A great glossary, and good vocabulary sidebar sections in each essay.  Bonus: Printed on recycled content paper, with a note on the Green Press Initiative at front, this book’s publisher walks the talk!

 

 

Here Is Antarctica

Madeleine Dunphy
Illustr Tom Leonard

Ages 3-8
Hardcover, 32 pages

Web of Life Children’s Books
ISBN: 978-0-9777539-4-9
$16.95      Buy the book

Realistic full color illustrations on luxurious spreads grace this ecological “story” of Antarctica’s wildlife. Written in an expanding verse narrative that echoes the rhyme of “the house that Jack built,” the book’s text vividly captures the close relationships of orcas, penguins, and seals, as well as petra, skua, silverfish and krill. The progression provides readers a dramatic pictorial account of this delicate and important food chain.

A spread at the end presents a brief essay on the wildlife of Antarctica, with illustrations of all the wildlife mentioned in the verse, as well as an invitation to contact the Antarctic & Southern Ocean Coalition to find out how to help ensure the protection of this precious habitat that supports so much life and beauty. 

 

Check out:

Polar Ice Capz– Polar Bear is the featured “friend in trouble"

Saving Polar Bears: video

Blubbermania Project(courtesy National Science Foundation Polar Connections)

Cool article on Antarctica, Global Warming, and Krill

In a cozy barn, far from the wiley weasels of NAARF, a multispecies family is baking something delicious. Up in her room, Cousin Clovis is cooking up a surprise. What could it be?  Find out when BooktiMookti Press launches its new series of middle readers -- Subscribe to this blog!