Plants Fight Back

by Lisa Amstutz, Rebecca Evans (Illustrator)

Overview

Botany for kids! Beautiful illustrations in this nature book provide information on the clever adaptations that help plants survive.

How do you survive when danger is near and you are rooted in the ground? Plants use their defenses and fight back!

As readers turn the pages of this beautifully illustrated book, they will find fun and poetic language describing various situation where different plants find themselves under attack. This is followed by informative, science-based lessons about these plants and their survival methods. Backmatter includes a glossary and a STEM challenge activity to use at home or in the classroom.

Backmatter Includes:

• Explore More for Kids: photos and information about the plants in this book.
• Explore More for Teachers & Parents: Literacy and Science connections!

A perfect book for:

• parents and teachers in search of homeschool supplies for kindergarten (or any grade!)
• anyone looking for children's books to help instill an appreciation of our planet!

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781728239293
Publisher:	Sourcebooks
Publication date:	12/01/2020
Sold by:	Barnes & Noble
Format:	eBook
Pages:	32
Lexile:	AD780L (what's this?)
File size:	16 MB
Note:	This product may take a few minutes to download.
Age Range:	4 - 8 Years

Editorial Reviews

"[A] great read for youngsters who enjoy scientific non-fiction, and as a text to introduce a lesson or unit on adaptations." — Youth Services Book Review

"Lighthearted but cogent fare for young naturalists and foragers. " — Kirkus Reviews

" A colorful, age-appropriate gateway to a deeper understanding of plant life." — Booklist

"Teachers and educators looking for unique material to explain plant science might want to give this title a try." — School Library Journal

From the Publisher

12/01/2020

Gr 2–4—Full-page cartoon illustrations accompanied by rhyming text teach readers how to recognize and identify plants, including poison ivy, nettle, and poison oak. Dark-skinned and light-skinned children are depicted throughout the text. The illustration of a Boy Scout Troop hiking through the woods shows brown-skinned scouts with textured hair. The "Science Connection" section provides activities for teachers, educators, and/or group leaders to share with their students. "Literacy Connection" features tips for reading aloud and a short question and answer with Amstutz and Evans. A ten-word glossary is also included. Students are encouraged to design a plant and create a model of it. "Let's Have a Plant Party" is available online as a student handout, with a diagram. Surprising plant facts will engage readers: "Some fold their leaves and pretend to be dead, in hopes that a predator might be misled"; "When cotton plants are being eaten by caterpillars, they send out an "SOS signal"—an invisible cloud of chemicals—into the air." VERDICT Teachers and educators looking for unique material to explain plant science might want to give this title a try.—Susan Scheps, formerly at Shaker P.L., OH

School Library Journal

2020-09-15
Running away not being an option, plants have developed an arsenal of defenses against animal attacks.

Pairing notes in prose to rhymed couplets, Amstutz tallies nearly a dozen ways that plants deliver comeuppances to would-be munchers. Most involve poisons or irritants, but strategies also include camouflage (stone plants), coating leaves with sand (sand verbena), or even providing homes for aggressive ants (the whistling thorn acacia). Willows can make their leaves unpalatable to tent caterpillars; cotton attacked by insect pests sends a chemical invitation to wasps; and woe betides a bug that lands among sticky geraniums, which “make oodles of thick, sticky glue. / Intruders soon find themselves trapped in the goo.” Along with reasonably recognizable plant specimens, Evans depicts otherwise accurately drawn animals, from giraffes to grasshoppers, with comically dismayed expressions as they are stymied. Groups of human figures in painted scenes—of picnickers oblivious to marauding raccoons and a troop of hikers cowering away from nettles and poison ivy—are racially diverse. Select flora and fauna feature in a photo gallery at the end, which is followed by suggestions for STEAM extension activities. (This book was reviewed digitally with 9-by-21-inch double-page spreads viewed at 75% of actual size.)

Lighthearted but cogent fare for young naturalists and foragers. (Informational picture book. 7-10)

Kirkus Reviews