Animals Nobody Loves

I am a big fan of nonfiction texts. I love learning new things and exploring worlds that actually exist. Growing up I was one of those children who had books on everything that I loved. I wanted to know as much as I could about things that interested me. I have books on presidents, dance, magic and my favorite was my collection of encyclopedia for kids. I love learning facts, it really interest me. So, I think that children will respond great to nonfiction texts. Some will enjoys them more than others however I think that learning about life, our world, history and all those other fun things will really spark children's interest.

Title: Animals Nobody Loves
Author: Seymour Simon
Illustrator: The photos are real pictures of animals that were taken by a variety of photographers
Publisher and date of publication: Sea Star Books, 2001
Genre: Nonfiction, Informational Text
Grade: 3-5

Animal’s Nobody Loves is a book about just that. In this book you learn about sharks, bats, piranhas, rats, hyena's and many other animals that most people often view as ugly and disgusting. The purpose of this book was to inform children about what miraculous creatures these animals are even if they are mean and ugly. The book address the fact that they should be respected for the things that they do do and how they contribute to our life cycle. The book introduces students to habitats, eating habits, facts and unique characteristics about each animal. By then end the book hopes to have changed your mind about these non-loved animals and hopes that you will consider liking or even respecting them.

I loved this book. I am an avid animal channel watcher and often learn and hear about many of the animals that were in this book. Surprisingly enough I learned things that I did not know about some of these creatures. For example did you know that vultures could spot a dying animal from forty miles away? Or did you know that a man-of-war consist of a colony of different kinds of creatures that coexist. This book is full of interesting, fun and sometimes vulgar information. Reading about rats and ants makes my skin crawl however they do do some good in this world. Books like this are good for children to read they are fun, short tid bits of information that actually that entertain and are easy to remember. I love the idea of getting educated and not even knowing it.

I would use this book in a variety of ways. You could use it to introduce different kinds of habitats, eating patterns or characteristics of animals. I think it would be fun to have them read a book like this and then chose one animal to do a project one and learn more about it. At the end of the book it ask the reader to make a list of other animals that they do not like and to think of reasons why. I think it would be fun to have your students compile this list but then have them do mini research projects on them. Helping them to learn more about them and understand them. These are just a few neat ideas that we as teachers could do in the classroom. The idea is to have fun with it and make it educational at the same time.