Human Body: Information Graphics by Peter Grundy

-

Infographics: Human Body by data journalist Simon Rogers and graphic artist Peter Grundy is the second book in a great new series from the fantastic folks at Big Picture Press. Infographics: Animal Kingdom came out earlier this year and is seeing a lot of action in my school library. Rogers has a way with collecting information that is out of the ordinary while covering familiar ground at the same time and Grundy's graphics are as eye-catching as they are easy to read.


The senses, reproduction, the heart, the brain, digestion, the skeleton, and the "human factory," are the focus of the seven chapters in the book, each of which begin with an overview of the subject. Once inside the chapters, facts detailing the functions and form of featured body parts are presented alongside interesting tidbits like the average number of babies born in America on each day of the week and a two-page spread called "the human hotel" in which various parasites are shown on or in the places on the body where they  live.

The chapter on reproduction does not specifically explain how babies are made, mentioning only that, "when male sperm enter the female womb, an egg, or ovum, can be fertilized and begin to grow," in the introduction. However, the male and female reproductive parts are presented, infographic style, and their functions detailed. A two page spread on conception shows how long sperm can live once inside the female in various animals, the average number of sperm per ejaculation for pigs, humans and rats, and the average speed of ejaculated sperm for humans and how it compares with other travel speeds. The chapter also covers what the different cries babies make mean, how much sleep babies need by age and how long to parts of the body take to finish growing. All very interesting information to be shared at the right time.

Other books in the series:


Infographics: Animal Kingdom  and, coming soon, Space!

Source: Review Copy

Popular posts from this blog

Be a Tree! by Maria Gianferrari illustrated by Felicita Sala

-
Image
Be a Tree! by Maria Gianferrari illustrated by Felicita Sala Review Copy from Abrams Kids I picture-walked Be a Tree! three times before I actually read the words. Felicita Sala's illustrations for Maria Gianferrari's poetic text are mesmerizingly immersive and richly colorful within a palette of earth tones. Throughout the text, Gianferrari, who shares her inspiration for this book in the author's note ( Peter Wohleben's The Hidden Life of Trees ), gently maintains the human connection to trees and the connections (and communications) trees share with each other.  Be a Tree!  begins exuberantly, inviting the reader to "Be a tree! Stand tall. Stretch your branches to the sun. Let your roots curl, coil in the soil to ground you." From your spine/trunk to your skin/bark and your heart/pith, the words carry you inward and then zoom outward and up to the canopy and ultimately, the forest. "You are one of many trees," and our roots "twine with fung
Read more

Under Earth, Under Water by Aleksandra Mizielińska and Daniel Mizieliński, 112 pp, RL: ALL AGES

-
Image
Under Earth , Under Water by Aleksandra Mizielińska and Daniel  Mizieliński is their fourth book I have reviewed here and their fourth book with the marvelous Big Picture Press , a publisher of oversized, highly illustrated, gorgeous books who believe that books should be "visually intelligent, surprising, and accessible to readers of all ages, abilities and nationalities." BPP definitely achieves this with every book they publish and, if you are a book lover, you will want to seek out all their titles. Under Earth , Under Water will appeal to anyone who likes to look inside things and understand how things work. With Under Earth, Under Water , the Mizielińskis, who have an illustration style that is filled with tiny details and a unique palette, take readers on a detailed journey, from the top of the page to the bottom, over and under land and then sea. The endpapers serve as the introduction and table of contents, with images scattered across the spread, page nu
Read more

Reading Levels: A Quick Guide to Determining if a Book Is Right for Your Reader

-
Image
While I wrote an article titled Reading Levels: How I Assign Reading Levels to Books, How the Publishers Do It and How You Can Help Your Reader Find the Right Book at the Right Time that discusses how reading levels are determined by professionals and amateurs like myself, there is more on this subject to discuss. Determining the reading level of a book from the children's section is never easy, mostly because there are several different standardized methods of determining reading levels. Add to this the fact that knowing their children's reading level is most often the only tool a parent is armed with when exploring the bookstore, library, website, etc, and the job becomes even more difficult. While I think that knowing a child's reading level is a very valuable tool if your child is reading below grade level, I think that it is a secondary consideration when finding books for children reading above, especially well above, grade level because, in most cases, content app
Read more