Mountains of Information

There’s more to earth science than earthquakes and volcanoes. The best books on the topic strike a balance between exciting descriptions of natural disasters and other news-making phenomena while covering the more mundane basics in a way that gives students a solid grasp of the workings of the world around them. This knowledge has always been important, but it is more crucial than ever in this environmentally aware age, when, for example, a grip on the mechanisms of climate change is essential to accepting and acting upon the dangers of global warming. The series recommended below will give students the background they need while wowing them with natural wonders.

Gr 3-5–These overviews provide bare-bones facts on a wide variety of subtopics. For example, Climate Change includes a time line of Earth’s climates and briefly describes each one, outlines the various factors that can cause changes, discusses global warming and its consequences, and lists some things that people can do (though the measures described can only be accomplished by adults or by the government). Apart from the information found in How Weather Works and Watching Weather, the material in this series is available in other titles. How Weather Works is useful because it features easy-to-understand graphics and a text that explains the layers of the atmosphere, what causes seasons, the water cycle, and how warm and cold currents move through the oceans. Watching Weather has fewer diagrams, but kids with a meteorological bent will enjoy learning how the information in the weather forecast is gathered, and how to interpret it in more detail. All of the books have large color photos and computer-generated illustrations.

Gr 3-5–These books open with a short overview of the landform and close with an outline of the environmental dangers to it. In between, a spread each describes the most (or, often, “one of the most”) extreme example of that feature. Entries consist of two short paragraphs of text; large, clear photographs; a sidebar of facts (some of the “That’s Amazing” listings are more tragic than amazing), and a small continent map with the place highlighted. While the color photographs are enjoyable, they do not always provide a sense of the feature. Coasts discusses the Curonian Spit, for example, but the photo shows dunes that could be on any coast. Some of the secondary features described are not shown; instead there are stock photos of something else. Also, it is not always clear why a landform is included. Explanations are overly brief and simplistic: Volcanoes provides nothing on plate tectonics, instead stating only that “Where there are cracks in Earth’s surface, the hot, liquid rock, called lava, can escape.” The opening explanation of the type of landform and the closing environmental information in these books can easily be found elsewhere. Finding the “Most Amazing” example of each formation will take a little more work, but the information provided in sources such as encyclopedias will be more thorough than that found here.

K-Gr 2-Each spread in these early readers provides a sentence or two, often in rhyming text, opposite a full-page, stock color photo or illustration. While the books are attractive, Keys, Maps, and North are often more concerned with making the text rhyme than with providing useful information. The tidbits don’t add up to any substance, and will not teach children how to use the navigation aids. The illustrations in Keys often feature computer-generated images that resemble overhead views of architectural models rather than maps. The texts are often oversimplified. Maps might lead children to believe that only world maps have cardinal directions, as it shows a world map whose caption reads, “North is above an imaginary line called the equator.” The other books offer useful introductions with some pleasant surprises. Continents, for example, encourages children to find the various landmasses on maps, while providing memorable facts, and Landforms describes the genesis of u-shaped and v-shaped valleys.

K-Gr 2–These easy-to-read titles feature dramatic covers and interior images. Short chapters describe what the phenomenon is, how and where it happens, safety, and how scientists are learning more about the events and how to predict them. Each attractive spread boasts a full-page color photograph. Some show the aftermath of a disaster (and even, in Avalanches for example, the phenomenon as it happens), but there are also some diagrams showing physical mechanisms and maps highlighting commonly affected places. The left side of each spread provides a few sentences of large-print text, with short, clear explanations. These books will work well as starting points for early reports but since they do not mention any specific events, they will need to be supplemented by more detailed works for those seeking examples.

K-Gr 1–Providing answers to at least some of the interminable “why” questions, these books feature an easy sentence or two per page on a large, attractive photograph. The titles describe the weather phenomenon under discussion, how it happens, how it can vary, and conditions it can cause. Cloudy, for example, explains how to distinguish the different types of clouds, and sometimes what type of weather they portend–stratus clouds are described as being “…as flat and gray as dusty books.... They hang low in the sky, waiting to spill rain.” The few simple scientific facts are introduced unobtrusively, and the books also provide information on what scientists in the field do and sometimes on a prominent person. Each title includes an easy activity, such as making a rain gauge in Rainy, that uses readily available materials. (Some, such as checking to see what temperature it is, aren’t exactly activities). Unfortunately, the further-reading suggestions are often for an older audience or are dated and may be unavailable.

Gr 7-9–These choppy and incomplete books attempt to cover too much and lack diagrams of how geological processes work. Some of the topics addressed in Canyons, for example, include the geological history of the Grand Canyon, how canyons are formed and studied, plate tectonics, the effects of tourism and other environmental hazards, related careers, and the future of canyons. Despite the series subtitle, the book includes a discussion of relevant landforms on Mars, but does not mention those under Earth’s oceans. In addition, some of the material in Glaciers is highly relevant to canyon creation, but is not included in the book on those formations. The best use of these books will be as jumping-off points for more serious research. They contain many examples that may pique students’ interest; have solid, current bibliographies; and their further-reading lists include exciting popular science materials such as (in Mountains) Simon Winchester’s Krakatoa.

Gr 7 Up–These excellent books detail familiar perils whose deadly potential students may not fully realize. The first chapter of each title opens with a gripping description of an event, related in a way that will draw readers in and that provides plenty of accessible science. A breathless account of the 1871 Peshtigo, WI, disaster in Wildfires, for example, includes information on the physics of a fire whirl. Black-and-white and color photographs on almost every page add to the drama. To varying degrees, the titles cover phenomena that are the subject of scientific and/or social debate. The authors describe both sides of the controversies, providing evidence for why mainstream science is right. Frequent sidebars, covering as much as a spread, discuss peripheral and often unusual information. The conclusion of each title explains what scientists are doing, or what they anticipate doing, to ameliorate the threat. The titles close with extensive chapter notes; those in Wildfires are especially extensive.

Gr 4-7–The value of the first six of these wide-ranging introductions lies in their clear explanations, lively presentations, and numerous household (or local) and global examples of their subjects. The short chapters in Minerals, for example, cover such standard fare as “What Is a Rock?” and “Sedimentary Rocks,” but are rescued by their use of short paragraphs that include helpful scientific definitions. Information in Climate Change ranges from an examination of Philadelphia’s climate over the past 30 years to a description of recent changes in Siberian permafrost. Multiple colorful sidebars and large and small diagrams and photographs will help students to grasp the fundamentals being discussed, and the easy but interesting science experiments will act as further reinforcements. Cycles brings together information that must normally be searched for across multiple volumes and drives home the message that Earth’s ecosystems and natural processes are delicately balanced and intertwined. Science Across Cultures, however, attempts to cover too much, discussing such diverse topics as science history and basics, careers, and controversies. Pass on this one.

Gr 4-6--These useful books, which include information on environmentalism, are divided into chapter spreads that sometimes concentrate on particular examples, such as “Niagara Falls” in Mighty Rivers, and at other times focus more on processes or features, such as “Volcanic Ridge” in World’s Oceans. Chapters are labeled as “Case Study” or “Science Report,” making the presentation lively. The concise explanations include just the right number of examples and clear diagrams, and have perfect color photo accompaniments. “News Flash” sidebars provide details of past disasters and can be fascinating, but they sometimes repeat information that is in the text or the photo captions. Earthquakes provides the most material that is not found elsewhere, such as a discussion of how human activity can trigger earthquakes, and uncommon details on the earthquake that triggered the 2004 Indian Ocean tsunami.

Gr 4-7–Five or six short chapters in these matter-of-fact books outline the essential facts of each phenomenon in clear language. The titles open with an account of a famous event–for example, Earthquakes re-creates the scene inside San Francisco’s Candlestick Park and farther afield when the Loma Prieta quake struck during the 1989 World Series. The texts go on to cover the science, to describe in general terms what happens during an event, and to offer safety advice. These latter sections discuss both personal safety and what scientists are doing to predict these phenomena. Scientific explanations are accompanied by plentiful color diagrams that will help students to grasp causes and effects. Sidebars on most spreads feature “It’s a Fact” statistics and other data, and question-and-answer boxes covering such puzzles as why Tornado Alley is so afflicted. There is some overlap in topics among the books–tsunamis are relevant in Earthquakes and Volcanoes, for example, but the coverage of them is not the same. Photos of disasters are necessarily dated and therefore grainy at times, but they are effective, and are sometimes turned into helpful, lively diagrams by the addition of such features as wind-direction arrows.

The best earth science series here for elementary readers is Capstone’s descriptive and attractive “Earth in Action,” though Lerner’s “What’s the Weather Like?” and some of the books in Rourke’s “Little World Geography” and Marshall Cavendish’s “Weather and Climate” series are useful supplements. For older readers, Morgan Reynolds’s “Extreme Threats,” which combines solid science with exciting firsthand accounts, stands out. But some of this season’s other offerings for middle and high school have merit too—consider Smart Apple Media’s “Amazing Planet Earth,” Enslow’s “The Science Behind Natural Disasters,” and all of the books in Raintree’s “Sci-Hi: Earth and Space Science” except Science Across Cultures.

John Peters, New York Public Library

Gr 2-3–These stimulating volumes each cover one planet’s internal and external structures, major moons (if any), and significant visits by space probes; Pluto also includes mentions of three other recently designated or discovered dwarf planets. The books in this series open with lists of words to look out for in the narrative, include picture captions that restate information in the accompanying text or even ask questions about it, and close with multimedia resource lists, as well as suggestions for adults on good ways to share and discuss books. Fleisher offers some uncommon information, noting for example that Venus’s day is longer than its year. The books are enhanced with mixes of space art and photography that has been reproduced with special attention to image sharpness and color clarity.

Gr 3-5–This series features a somewhat denser array of information than the previous one (which is for a younger audience), plus more on the asteroid and Kuiper belts (though not the even farther out Oort Cloud). It invites readers to board imagined spacecraft bound for the Sun and each planet, to make observations, and finally to consider whether humans could live in any of those hostile environments. Though the books also include unusual information, such as details on Mercury’s double sunrise, there are signs of carelessness, such as the misleading statement in Earth that “only the dwarf planet Pluto has a larger moon than Earth.” So much territory has been left for Uranus that Sparrow leaves the wild displacement of the planet’s magnetic field as an open question, and provides not even a speculative explanation for the startling news that Neptune’s rings are thicker on one side. Also, although the books feature clear photos, sometimes artists’ conceptions and photos are frequently blended together without distinction.