The Frog Scientist by Pamela Turner is a book that I can highly recommend (5 Stars worth!).
It tells the true story of Dr. Tyrone Hayes, a field biologist who is discovering the affects of pesticides (atrazine) on frogs. The photographs by Andy Comins are compelling and beautiful and add significant interest to this highly-readable book.
When I first received it, I looked over my tween daughter Amanda’s shoulder as she flipped through it. I saw photos of people working in a lab and oddly deformed frogs. I wasn’t sure that I would like it.
However, once I started reading — I loved it. The author does an excellent job of using and explaining scientific terms within the context of sharing Hayes’ research and mission. The text flows nicely and reads like a story. The photographs are truly fantastic.
Tyrone’s story was inspiring. He’s a good role model to kids who may not be interested in school, or science specifically, about the possibilities that are out there. It also ties the work of researchers that kids might see as boring, into the very real concerns that kids today have about the environment.
So the final test: I handed the book over to my 6th grade daughter.
She loves to read. . . .fiction. But once she started reading, she didn’t get up off the couch, and actually asked her brother to turn off the TV when he left the room.
I asked if she would read other books like that, and she still said that she prefers fiction, but she did like this book, and thinks that people who like non-fiction would really like it. This is a part of the Scientists in the Field series, so if people do like books like this, there is more where that came from.
I was happy to be one of the Cybils judges who awarded this the 2009 Cybils award for Middle Grade/YA Nonfiction. If you haven’t checked out the other winners and finalists, be sure to do so.
Jennifer Donovan caught frogs under the streetlights on long summer nights when she was a young girl and hasn’t feared them since. Read more of her childhood memories and her children’s present at Snapshot.
I admit to being just like Amanda- nonfiction isn’t what I reach for first, and I know that it’s not as well represented in our children’s book collection as fiction, certainly. Thanks for the reminder- and I’ll be looking for this one, because unlike me, my 9 year old son LOVES nonfiction. 🙂
This series looks really interesting! I have one boy who prefers fiction and one who prefers non-fiction. I think BOTH would like this book.
PS. I also caught frogs as a kid. 🙂
I enjoyed your review. I’d heard of this book and I want to read it. Like you, my 6th grade daughter prefers fiction. But she likes books like these. My wife made her decision to become a scientist at the age of 7, and that decision was made in part because of inspiring stories like those Turner writes.
I’d like to add that Pamela Turner has another excellent book for tweens/teens that follows a similar format. It’s called “Life on Earth and Beyond – An Astrobiologists Quest”. In this book she follows Dr. Chris McKay around the earth as he looks for extreme environments that closely resemble some of the environments found in space.
As McKay looks for life and the conditions for life, we learn a lot about what life is like for a scientist, how they think and work, and how they build theories. Author Pamela Turner does an outstanding job throughout and she portrays a very accurate picture of what scientists are like and how they work. I highly recommend it. I reviewed it on my site (which I don’t have much time to keep up anymore) last July.