Destination: Planet Earth

This book is a non-fiction book about Earth suitable for aged 7 upwards. It is also a non-fiction book masquerading as a lovely picture book and it is that feature which I think children will enjoy. The pictures are rich and involving and definitely get the 'oooh' from children. It is the sort of book that invites you to look at it due to the brightness of the pages and the detail worked into every one. Some of the pages have content featuring in many non-fiction books, like volcanoes and the water cycle. Others take a slightly different approach featuring tectonic plates or The Equator. All of the pages have child figures exploring the aspects being discussed and there are boxes of facts and information around each page. So, for example, The Poles has a box about melting ice caps and one about explorers and another about researchers taking ice samples. The text is quite complex and uses technical language but manages to make the ideas simple enough for younger children to begin to understand. On the page about the Atmosphere, for example, it explains the Greenhouse Effect, 'Like glass on a greenhouse, our ATMOSPHERE lets heat from the Sun in but stops too much escaping'. There are key words in capitals but sadly no glossary to go with them- in fact that would be my only criticism, there is no glossary, contents or index which further adds to the picture book feel, but would be useful to have. A big bonus for this book is a lovely double-sided poster at the back, one with a world map and the other side with a picture of figures standing on a sand dune - something I'd love to have adorning the walls of a classroom. The other highlight for me is the final page with its future thinking, an aspect of Geography so often missed out. Entitled Saving Planet Earth, this beautiful spread imagines a futuristic scene in which small changes like recycling have lead to bigger ones by reducing pollution. There is a list of achievable lifestyle changes, such a walking rather than driving and a green and flourishing cityscape. Many children may have watched the BBC David Attenborough series 'Blue Planet' and this book seems to follow on nicely from that. This book is a good addition to the geography canon of work for primary aged children. It is nicely presented, and each page makes you linger and read a bit more. This would make a good classroom resource and having seen there is another in the series on Space, shortlisted for the Blue Peter book award in 2017, I now want to go and see if that one is as lovely to look at and as interesting as this. 40 pages / Ages 7+ / Reviewed by Jacqueline Harris, teacher.

Suggested Reading Age 7+