ROCKS AND THE WORLD AROUND YOU

Perhaps the very first hobby that is recognizable as such with children is collecting stones. Stones from the driveway, the garden, the woods and the fields; stones chosen for their color, their shape, their glint of mineral. He is a book for those ""rockbound"" youngsters, which should lay the groundwork for intelligent understanding and constructive collecting. It starts out on an easy reading level, but unfortunately goes too far, too fast. The opening sections deal with basic qualities, recognizable to the six, seven and eight year olds:- color, weight, degree of hardness, indications of minerals, etc. Experiments are suggested, and ways of identification and cataloguing. It could- for this age group- have stopped there. But the author has gone on to more scientific and more difficult levels, so that the last part of the book would need adult interpretation for the beginner.