Science teacher Wiese (Cosmic Science, not reviewed) is back with 40 quick and often intriguing science puzzles and activities to promote understanding of the human body. Activities are grouped in body systems: Brain and nervous system; Senses, Digestive; Respiratory; Circulatory; Muscular, Skeletal, Reproductive and the Skin. For each section Wiese gives an introduction and a series of projects and experiments. He lists materials, procedures, provides an explanation of what happened, and often gives “more fun stuff to do.” Most projects and experiments require only a few minutes and items easily found in the kitchen: straws, plastic soda bottles, paper plates, ruler, balloons, bread, and scissors. Drawings show boys and girls having fun with science. Some activities are more crafts than science: in “Blood and Gore,” children make a batch of “fake blood,” from white corn syrup, corn starch, and soy sauce. The fake-blood project continues, creating a cocoa and petroleum jelly scab. Later the author explains the real components of blood. Sometimes the explanations are less than satisfactory. In “Bony Blocks,” he has the reader balance a book on a toilet-paper roll set on its side and standing on end. This, he explains, shows a hollow tube is almost as strong as a solid rod. However, whether the roll is on its side or on its end, it is still a hollow tube. There is a lot here to engage curious young people. The index was not seen. (glossary) (Nonfiction. 9-12)
Pub Date: April 1, 2000
ISBN: 0-471-33203-8
Page Count: 120
Publisher: Wiley
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 15, 2000
Charming, poignant, and thoughtfully woven.
An aspiring scientist and a budding artist become friends and help each other with dream projects.
Unfolding in mid-1980s Sacramento, California, this story stars 12-year-olds Rosalind and Benjamin as first-person narrators in alternating chapters. Ro’s father, a fellow space buff, was killed by a drunk driver; the rocket they were working on together lies unfinished in her closet. As for Benji, not only has his best friend, Amir, moved away, but the comic book holding the clue for locating his dad is also missing. Along with their profound personal losses, the protagonists share a fixation with the universe’s intriguing potential: Ro decides to complete the rocket and hopes to launch mementos of her father into outer space while Benji’s conviction that aliens and UFOs are real compels his imagination and creativity as an artist. An accident in science class triggers a chain of events forcing Benji and Ro, who is new to the school, to interact and unintentionally learn each other’s secrets. They resolve to find Benji’s dad—a famous comic-book artist—and partner to finish Ro’s rocket for the science fair. Together, they overcome technical, scheduling, and geographical challenges. Readers will be drawn in by amusing and fantastical elements in the comic book theme, high emotional stakes that arouse sympathy, and well-drawn character development as the protagonists navigate life lessons around grief, patience, self-advocacy, and standing up for others. Ro is biracial (Chinese/White); Benji is White.
Charming, poignant, and thoughtfully woven. (Fiction. 9-12)Pub Date: Jan. 12, 2021
ISBN: 978-0-06-300888-5
Page Count: 304
Publisher: Quill Tree Books/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: Oct. 26, 2020
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 15, 2020
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
Remarking that ``nothing about the weather is very simple,'' Simon goes on to describe how the sun, atmosphere, earth's rotation, ground cover, altitude, pollution, and other factors influence it; briefly, he also tells how weather balloons gather information. Even for this outstanding author, it's a tough, complex topic, and he's not entirely successful in simplifying it; moreover, the import of the striking uncaptioned color photos here isn't always clear. One passage—``Cumulus clouds sometimes build up into towering masses called cumulus congestus, or swelling cumulus, which may turn into cumulonimbus clouds''—is superimposed on a blue-gray, cloud-covered landscape. But which kind of clouds are these? Another photo, in blue-black and white, shows what might be precipitation in the upper atmosphere, or rain falling on a darkened landscape, or...? Generally competent and certainly attractive, but not Simon's best. (Nonfiction. 10-12)
Pub Date: Aug. 1, 1993
ISBN: 0-688-10546-7
Page Count: 40
Publisher: Morrow/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 15, 1993
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