AboutThis IssueBrain BumpersProjectsReviewsFeaturesTeacher's GuideSubscriber ServicesStore

Up Close! Exploring Nature With a Magnifying Glass
Cover Up Close! Exploring Nature With a Magnifying Glass
Author: Sarah Jane Brian
Publisher: Reader’s Digest Childrens Books
Product: Book (53 Pages)
Ages: 7 and up
Cost: $21.95
Get up close and personal with...a slug! Too slimy? How about a skittering crab? Well, that might be too skittish for the magnifying glass provided by Up Close! There’s lots to see of the natural world with the Reader’s Digest Up Close! series. In this book, author Brian guides future explorers through the woods, fields, streams, beaches, and backyards or parks.
    The author gives helpful hints on how to take notes and how to “track” wildlife, such as ants. Go ahead, place a candy bar near an anthill. Watch what happens after one ant finds the food—it doesn’t take long for another ant to come along for a bite, or another, and another. Find out how they do that. And whatever you do, be careful when training that magnifying glass on an ant when it’s sunny!
Sasha Curry

Sasha Curry
Age 8

I liked the pictures in the book and the magnifying glass that came with it. The topic was very interesting because I love bugs. The activities in the book definitely helped me understand the bugs better. The activities were a good combination of hard and easy things to do. What I enjoyed most about the book were the experiments because they were fun! I actually liked everything about the book and would change nothing. I learned a lot about surface tension, for example. Surface tension helps bugs walk on water. I also learned that poison ivy can irritate your skin and cause itching, swelling, and blisters! Some of the best features of the book, however, were the pictures. My overall impression was that this book is interesting. The one word I would use to describe Up Close! is: fun! The book scores a 10 out of 10 for me.

(Originally published in the Sept/Oct 2001 issue of YES Mag.)


Copyright © 2003 Peter Piper Publishing Inc.
Last updated April 14, 2003.