Time to Eat

I saw a new trio of non-fiction books come into my library recently.  All three books are small, geared towards a younger audience and look at some of the daily habits of animals: eating, sleeping and bathing. Actually, as you read through the books you learn that for some animals, these habits are not so daily.  I love the style of husband and wife duo - Steve Jenkins and Robin Page - the images are simple, the text is short, but the reader leaves with a lot of information and intrigue.

I read Time to Eat out loud to three boys - a 5, 4 and 3 year old.  The book starts with the question, "What is your favorite food?"  To which I heard gleeful screams, "Pizza!  Macaroni and cheese!"  They were quick to find out that these animals ate very differently from them.  Whether it was a Panda Bear eating bamboo shoots for 12 hours a day or an anaconda eating only four or five meals a year, swallowed whole, and sometimes as large as a jaguar, they were fascinated.  Their favorite was, of course, the dung beetle.

I love the fascinating, yet brief information that keeps even young children engaged.  But at the end of the book there is a section with more information on each animal.  After reading that a young blue whale can gain 200 pounds in 24 hours, the five year old wanted to know how big blue whales can get - thanks to the end page bios on each animal, I could tell him up to 390,000 pounds.

This is a fantastic non-fiction book - definitely one to add to your own collection or your library bag.  I can't wait to check out the other two in this series - Time to Sleep and Time for a Bath.

For more great Non-Fiction reads - check out this weeks round-up of Non-Fiction Monday at True Tales & A Cherry On Top.