Books about African Animals
There are (at least) two amazing new books out for elementary students that revolve around African animals, come check them out!
The first one is the third from Katherine Applegate about a group of animals that lived in a mall in Seattle, Washington. The first one was the One and Only Ivan about a silverback gorilla, told from the gorilla's point of view. The second was The One and Only Bob, about a stray dog that lived with the gorilla and told from the dog's point of view. This one, The One and Only Ruby is told from a baby elephant's point of view. Ruby and Ivan have been relocated to a zoo that has spaces that mimic their natural habitats. Ivan lives in an enclosure with other gorillas and has a wonderful companion gorilla. Ruby lives in an adjoining enclosure, with a herd of other female elephants. Ruby is anxious about her coming of age ceremony-Tuskday, where the other elephants will celebrate her getting her tusks. It turns out Ruby is anxious about tusks because of what happened to her mother as well as other elephants. Ruby is a wonderful story teller, full of mischief and joy, in spite of some of the horrible things she's witnessed. Readers will have an opporunity to learn about elephant behavior in the wild as well as how humans have tried to make money off wild animals. Parts of the story are hard to read (one kind of person might have been weeping copiously) but the story has a satisfying, if not exactly happy ending. Kids are going to love this one for so many reasons-the connection to Ivan and Bob, the information about elephants, not to mention what an adorable character Ruby is. This is a wonderful collection to that series. Don't miss it!
The second one is non fiction and it's by one of my favorite authors, Sandra Markle. It's called The Great Giraffe Rescue, and like some of her other books like The Great Penguin Rescue and of course her amazing series "What if you had animal..." which, although our library has all of these in our collection, they are never actually in the library, except when someone brings one back and then it's only a moment and until it's snatched up by someone else. My students LOVE her books, so I was super excited to see a new addition to her book list! This one is all about Nubian giraffes. The Nubian giraffes live in Uganda and it turns out, a very rich oil deposit was discovered right in the middle of the park where most of the giraffes lived. The park people came up with a plan to relocate the giraffes to different parts of Uganda, in some cases, re-establishing giraffes that had gone extinct. There are lots of facts of about giraffes but also a lot of information on the problem solving that the park rangers and scientists had to do in order to safely relocate the giraffes. I found it fascinating and I know the kids will too! There are also lots of gorgeous photos so you can really appreciate how beautiful the giraffes are. Don't miss this one, it's terrific!
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