Germ Theory for Babies (Baby University)

Written by Chris Ferrie, Neal Goldstein and Joanna Suder

Sourcebooks

978-1-7282-3407-6

24 pp.

Ages 4-8

February 2021 

The series may be called Baby University and the books' titles always state that they're "for babies" but there is nothing infantile about the topics addressed in Chris Ferrie's books or the approach taken to do so.

From Germ Theory for Babies by Chris Ferrie, Neal Goldstein and Joanna Suder

 

In Germ Theory for Babies which was written with epidemiologist Neal Goldstein and public health attorney Joanna Suder, Chris Ferrie explains how people get sick, starting with the original theory of miasmas causing illness before closer examination of the sick person, ultimately with microscopy, revealed tiny creatures at work. Differentiating between those that can be useful like lactobacillus and those that can make us sick i.e., germs, the authors discuss how germs can be spread, especially important to know during a pandemic. (Actually everything in this book is important to know during a pandemic!)

From Germ Theory for Babies by Chris Ferrie, Neal Goldstein and Joanna Suder

Making sure to speak to young readers, the authors emphasize that germs can live anywhere, including home, school and the environment and can live for different amounts of time, depending on the type. While hitting all the salient information about germs, Chris Ferrie, Neal Goldstein and Joanna Suder give us capsule drawings of a variety of bacteria, viruses and mould including coronavirus, ebolavirus, staphylococcus, streptococcus, rhinovirus, norovirus and aspergillus.

From Germ Theory for Babies by Chris Ferrie, Neal Goldstein and Joanna Suder

 

 

 

 

 

Most relevant for little ones is how to prevent the spread, including not touching one's mouth, nose or eyes, washing hands properly, covering your mouth and even wearing a mask, and staying home when feeling unwell.

From Germ Theory for Babies by Chris Ferrie, Neal Goldstein and Joanna Suder

Germ Theory for Babies is a great primer about germs, how they spread and how to prevent that spread. The text is written at a very easy reading level, with the whole book probably comprising of fewer than two hundred words and most of those being only one or two syllables. The illustrations which appear to be digitally rendered are clean and distinct, appropriate for a concept book, and use white space to effectively focus the reader's attention. Still, zoom bubbles are utilized to provide magnified details of the germs and, while simple, they are accurate and demonstrate the variety of forms that germs can take. (Ebolavirus is a particularly unusual shape.)

 

Don't be put off by the "for Babies" component of the title. These are lessons far beyond those for babies, even if in board book format, but the idea of teaching big concepts in a format perfect for the very young is the whole idea behind Baby University which advances its books as "Simple explanations of complex ideas for your future genius." Germ Theory for Babies should be available to all young children, whether they can read for themselves or not, to understand what we're going through right now with the COVID-19 pandemic and for illnesses from cold viruses, mould and more. But Germ Theory for Babies does more than just enlighten; it also empowers. It prepares children to take precautions and it helps them understand that they can fight back. In other words, it has lessons for everyone.

• • • • • •

Baby University includes over thirty titles by Canadian-born physicist and mathematician Chris Ferrie, including Pandemics for Babies, Rocket Science for Babies, Climate Change for Babies and Robotics for Babies. I encourage teachers and parents interested in fostering scientific exploration with young children to check out the whole series as well as other Chris Ferrie titles, including Scientist, Scientist, Who Do You See? which I reviewed several years ago.

Nikki Tesla and the Traitors of the Lost Spark (Elements of Genius #3): Guest review

 This review was written by teacher Elizabeth Cook.

Written by Jess Keating

Illustrated by Lissy Marlin

Scholastic

978-1-338614763

288 pp.

Ages 8-12

July 2020

If I told you this book was about an elite team of individuals who travelled the world to defeat evil, you might imagine a team of expertly-trained adults with many weapons at their disposal. You would be wrong. This book is about a group of seven kids from the Genius Academy.  All seven students had been sent to the Genius Academy because of their unbridled talents and who, along with Nikki’s pet ferret Pickles, take on secret missions to save the world from relentless villains.

The protagonist and newest recruit is Nikki Tesla, a fabulous inventor with a scientific brain. She joined the other six academy students a year earlier after she blew up her bedroom with her death ray invention and chose the Genius Academy over prison.  The rest of the team includes: Bert Einstein, a visionary; Adam “Mo” Mozart, a musical prodigy; Mary Shelley who is the literary mind of the group; Charlie Darwin, a biologist specializing in animals; Grace O’Malley, the group's leader and a real people person; and Leo da Vinci, the multi-talented polymath and Nikki’s crush. 

From Nikki Tesla and the Traitors of the Lost Spark by Jess Keating, illus. by Lissy Marlin

At the beginning of this third book in the series, Nikki is enjoying her well-deserved vacation in Costa Rica. She has had a busy and adventure-filled first year at the Genius Academy: travelling the world, flying planes, and fighting evil masterminds. However, her break is short-lived with the arrival of her Genius Academy friends who whisk her off on their next mission: to stop a nasty virus (nicknamed SPARK) from being released and causing devastating consequences to mankind. (Pretty apropos, don’t you think?) Nikki and her Genius Academy friends travel to England to track down V, the villain responsible for SPARK. Nikki and the Genius Academy students must save the world from the SPARK virus while evading the diligent MI6 secret agents who think they are the culprits who have blown up the Tower of London...all in a day’s work for these child prodigies!

What I love about the Elements of Genius series is that, outside of being quirky geniuses, the characters are so relatable. Every time Nikki acts on impulse or regrets what she just said, I can feel the red starting to rise in my own cheeks. She has flaws and is very real, still developing as a character which readers will have witnessed through the three books in the series. We learned a lot about her past in the earlier books, Nikki Tesla and the Ferret-Proof Death Ray (2019) and Nikki Tesla and the Fellowship of the Bling (2020) but this book allows us to get to know a bit more about some of the other Genius Academy students. We also get to meet another child genius, Arthur Conan Doyle, a master of deduction, who doesn’t attend the Academy despite being offered a spot many years ago. Learning more about these characters helps us better understand their motivations and behaviour. It is also interesting to see how the introduction of a new child genius works, or doesn’t work, with an established team who are trying to save the world. 

I am a big fan of Jess Keating’s work. In addition to the Elements of Genius series, she writes excellent nonfiction books about weird animals, inspiring picture books about women in science, YA novels, and graphic novels too. Each of her books is a fun and informative read. Despite my best attempts at internet sleuthing, I can’t determine if a fourth Elements of Genius is already in the works or not, though I sincerely hope it is. These Genius Academy students are excellent role models for our middle grade readers. Each student has their own unique talents in various fields of study. When they work together, they are able to overcome enormous hurdles and just happen to save the world in the process. With its promotion of STEM, problem solving with peers, and self-acceptance, this series has it all.

~ Reviewer Elizabeth Cook is a teacher in the Halton District School Board. She is an avid reader and fan of Canadian literature. 

The Way We Fall

Written by Megan Crewe
Hyperion Disney Group
978-1-4231-4616-2
308 pp.
Ages 12+
2011

There are many ways to fall.  You can fall down, fall in love, fall apart, fall asleep, fall at someone's feet, fall back, fall away, fall behind, fall flat on your face, fall short, fall afoul. And in Megan Crewe's first book in her YA Fallen World Trilogy, The Way We Fall, someone at sometime has demonstrated each type of falling.  On an island that succumbs to the wrath of an infectious virus, "falling" becomes the norm.

Through the journal entries of sixteen-year-old Kaelyn, ostensibly to her former best friend Leo who is going to school off the island, the reader is taken on a harrowing trek from health to illness to fear and death, with valiant efforts throughout to manage, if not eradicate, a contagion.  When the infection first hits, it is hard to differentiate it from a cold, with the typical coughing and sneezing.  However, when relentless scratching is evident, followed by displays of extreme expression of affection, distrust and hysteria, coupled with delusions, hospitalization is required. As the microbiologist on the island, Kaelyn's father becomes a central figure in the investigation of the virus, and Kaelyn, her older brother Drew, and Mom, an islander who manages the local café at the local service station, are among the first to wear masks and keep themselves home to avoid contact with others.

With the spread of the illness and deaths recorded from it, some islanders find their way off the island, though some, like Kaelyn's Uncle Emmett and her seven-year-old cousin, Meredith, are encouraged to wait until the mainland has secured a site to process them.  But, when the island is quarantined, the residents become reliant on the mainland government for food and medical and other supplies, a position that many protest, with consequences.  The reactions of the islanders as well as the mainlanders, including soldiers sent to offer protection, to the quarantine could warrant a study in fear.

While Kaelyn volunteers to notify residents of the quarantine and help get ill residents to hospital, Leo's girlfriend Tessa is recruited to help grow plants that may offer hope for treatment (a passionate gardener, Tessa has her own greenhouse).   A young man, Gav, who'd organized a group of guys into a Fight Club, had them "looting" from the grocery store and storing goods in a warehouse, arranging deliveries to those who couldn't get out, were ill, or had no support systems.  Through a series of interactions, including Gav coming by to teach them some self-defense, he and Kaelyn grow closer, offering each other support and affection in a troubling situation.

While I have shared very little about the sequence of events that lead to the story's end, probably because the plot and subplots are complex (but elegant), the reader will not be given much reprise from action and chaos of a community faced with more than a contagion; the mentality of those quarantined presents as much turmoil as the fatal infection itself.  The psychological responses of the residents to living with a contagious illness and in a quarantined situation vary from heroic and charitable to egocentric and even mercenary.  With a complex menagerie of characters, coupled with Megan Crewe's plotting and organizational style i.e., Kaelyn's short, dated journal entries addressed to Leo, The Way We Fall successfully keep readers interested throughout, appropriately earning it a nomination for this year's Forest of Reading®'s White Pine Award.  While the book offers some hope in its conclusion, don't expect everything to be resolved by the time the ferry finally approaches the island again; after all that falling, it will take a lot to help everything right itself ("in love" exempted).

Luckily, The Lives We Lost, Book 2 in the Fallen World Trilogy, came out just last month, and the title of the third book, The World We Make, has been announced for release in the winter of 2014. Megan Crewe can be assured that this reviewer will be pursuing those titles promptly, determined to learn more about Leo, Drew, Aunt Lillian, the underlying hostility between Drew and Gav, and the only positive fall - Kaelyn and Gav in love.