Non-Fiction Monday: Usborne Encyclopedia of World History

I’d read many positive reviews of The Usborne Internet-Linked Encyclopedia of World History and I’d been looking forward to checking it out when we were ready to use it.  I requested it from the library last week, and I was pleasantly surprised to see what a large portion was devoted to prehistory since that’s what [...]

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Non-Fiction Monday: Life on Earth by Steve Jenkins

I’m making plans for a prehistory/evolution study with 6yo M, so when I saw Life on Earth: The Story of Evolution by Steve Jenkins on top of a library shelf, I grabbed it.  C (2yo) saw it in the library bag and asked me to read it, so the three of us sat down and [...]

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Non-Fiction Monday: What Makes A Magnet?

What Makes A Magnet? by Franklyn Branley is another title from the excellent Let’s-Read-and-Find-Out Science series. M and I checked it out and did several of the suggested experiments a few years ago, but she remembered it recently and asked me to get it again.  She’s been wanting to do some magnet experimen,t but she [...]

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Non-Fiction Monday: Reign of the Sea Dragons

I picked up Reign of the Sea Dragons by Sneed B. Collard  from the New Arrivals shelf at our library. I thought M would enjoy the descriptions of prehistoric sea creatures and their evolution since she is fascinated by large creatures of the sea and dinosaurs.  The inside cover has shows a scaled comparison of [...]

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Non-Fiction Monday: Dinosaur Babies

We love the Let’s Read and Find Out Science series and we’ve read many many of the titles.  One of our favorites is Dinosaur Babies by Kathleen Weidner Zoehfeld.  Both my girls are particularly fond of Maisaura due in part to one of their favorite Diego episodes, but also because they stayed by their nest [...]

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Non-Fiction Monday: Many Luscious Lollipops

Many Luscious Lollipops is part of Ruth Heller’s World of Language series.  This title is all about adjectives, different ways to use them, different forms they take, general versus specific.  Rather than being dry like a book about adjectives could be, Many Luscious Lollipops, is written in fast-paced engaging verse and illustrated with brightly-colored humorous [...]

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Non-Fiction Monday: Awesome Ocean Science

M requested more science experiments for our homeschool days and when I ran across Awesome Ocean Science: Investigating teh Secrets of the Underwater World, I knew it would be a hit since it would fulfill her request and fit into our ongoing ocean study. All the experiments can be done with simple materials you likely [...]

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Non-Fiction Monday: Super Swimmers by Caroline Arnold

Continuing our focus on marine mammals, we picked up Super Swimmer: Whales, Dolphins, and Other Mammals of the Sea by Caroline Arnold. The opening pages describe ways marine mammals are designed to fit their environment: torpedo shaped bodies, blowholes, blubber, etc.  Then different groups of mammals like whales and dolphins, seals and walruses, are explained [...]

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Non-Fiction Monday: Boy Were We Wrong About the Dinosaurs

Boy Were We Wrong About the Dinosaurs by Kathleen V. Kudlinski describes the earliest known explanations of dinosaur fossils  – they were the bones of magical dragons.  Then Kudlinski explains how some more recent ideas about dinosaurs now sound almost as unlikely.  The final section explains how many things we still don’t know and how [...]

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Non-Fiction Monday: Down, Down, Down

My girls continue to be fascinated by sea creatures of all types.  On our last library run, we picked up Down, Down, Down: A Journey to the Bottom of the Sea by Steve Jenkins.  The book has a great balance of illustrations and interesting information.  With each page you learn about creatures at a different [...]

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