Pond Life Nature Activity Book: Educational Games & Activities for Kids of All Ages

Book Description

Each book features 64 pages of fun games and activities relating to nature study. Contents feature more than 16 types of games that highlight a wide range of
topics. Suitable for ages 5 and up.

Customer Reviews:

Carefully read book description on Amazon...........2006-02-07

Not what I wanted....but I'm giving a 5 because it's my fault I didn't read the book description thoroughly. Had I, I'd have realized it is not they type of book that gives nature activities TO DO outdoors with my kids....but is (as stated) a book with puzzles, mazes, almost academic stuff you do SITTING at a table basically.

So, again, my fault for not reading description, it is EXACTLY as described. If I wanted to brush up academically with my kids, or with art even (the oregami) then it would have been a great book for us. A child that enjoys puzzles, mazes, 'quiet' work would love this book. I'm sure my 8 year old would love some of it, like the mazes.

I would think it'd be a very good for home schooling type activities, not good for 'HANDS ON' physically active type learning. I have a friend that home schools and plan to give it to her. I think she and her kids will really enjoy it.

Book Description

This illustrated guide book describes over sixty of the colonial monasteries built by missionaries in Mexico during the 16th century, after the Spanish Conquest. The guide describes the buildings region by region, with details on their history and architecture as well as of the art treasures found within. Complete with maps, plans, bibliography. Fully Indexed. A valuable source for travelers and researchers. The only recent guide on the subject in English

Customer Reviews:

Essential companion for travels in central Mexico & Oaxaca........2001-03-14

This is an excellent book. It is by far the most readable and detailed account of these wonderful colonial monuments in either English or Spanish.

Superbly illustrated with dozens of original line drawings, this is a comprehensive survey of more than sixty ancient monasteries in central Mexico and Oaxaca. Many of them are architectural masterpieces. Most of them house extraordinary artistic treasures, whether in the form of murals, paintings, fonts or alterpieces.

The small villages where many of them are found go unrecorded in conventional tourist guides. Perry's landmark book has easy-to-follow sketch maps locating all the places described in the text and contains literally hundreds of little-known facts about the buildings, their contents and the background to their construction.

Why should you be interested in these monuments? Because, to quote the author, these are "buildings that not only mirror a crucial period in the history of the Americas, but continue to play a central role in the life of the Mexican people today." Few Americans know very much about the missions and monasteries of Mexico and anyone interested in the history of Mexico's colonial period, or interested in the country's art and architecture, will enjoy reading this book, even if they are unable to visit first-hand all the places described.

The book's value as a reference source is enhanced by a useful glossary, extensive bibliography and complete index.

Average customer rating:
Mexico's Fortress Monasteries
Richard Perry
Manufacturer: Espadana Press
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback
ASIN: B000U5U4F6

Average customer rating:
Mexico's Fortress Monasteries
Richard Perry
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback
ASIN: B000U5U44W

Book Description

What is a monster? Is it a thing with a hairy face, webbed fingers, and green skin? Or is it simply anything we don't understand? An art book for and about the curious, Special Cases explores humanity's age-old obsession with mythical and literal monstrosity in a way that is not for the faint-hearted. Using photographs she has taken at natural history and anatomical museums, models of her own creation, and artwork from numerous private and public collections, celebrated photographer Rosamond W. Purcell delightedly delves into squeamish subjects such as dwarves, giants, conjoined twins, hairy people, albinos, and humans with animal heads. Sure to capture the imagination of artists, historians, and anyone with a taste for the perverse, Special Cases is a clever visual history whose pages and pictures reveal the fiipside of what we call normal.

Customer Reviews:

Interesting, if you don't pay too much for it........2006-09-14

If you get this used, you won't mind so much that it repeats itself too often and runs out of steam halfway. I think I am much swayed by the photos, this is a coffee-table book, not a reference book. I am boggled at the typography decisions, I suppose someone has been reading too much WIRED and thought it looked avant garde. It does reek.

If you are much into the subject I'd say you will find something to enrich you here, esp if you can get a good deal on the book somewhere.

Disappointing.......2004-10-20

I got the feeling he wrote a book around some vacations he took. He references the Mutter Museum multiple times, so if you're really interested in a book on anomalies, look into the Mutter Museum book. Don't waste your money on this one!!

A Disappointment.......2000-06-23

Visually, the book is rewarding. The author has photographed her specimens imaginatively, compelling the reader to look twice to identify the subject matter. The text, however, is a great disappointment. Not only is the format confusing (as some reviewers have already pointed out), but with a writing style so disjointed and without an appreciable sense of structure, the book leaves us readers floundering in a fishpond, desperately seeking the shore.

Bizarre, at times slightly interesting but very flawed.......1999-10-28

This book could have been so much more. It is flawed by a very odd writing style---deadpan and stilted. The format is so odd as to make it almost unreadable at times---two blocks of print on each page, at very different levels, as if one is meant to be a caption, yet it isn't! The author doesn't seem to know whether she wants to be a book for the curious, or a book condemning you for being curious. A fascinating subject, which is why this book can be interesting at all, but really not handled well here---don't bother with this one.

a mediocre overview of a fascinating subject.......1999-04-05

The illustrations are spectacular in Special Cases, and many of the anecdotes are vividly written. But the author also omits much of the subject matter's historical and scientific context, leaving the "special cases" looking more like simple freaks. As well, this book is poorly organized and poorly edited, so that by the end I was completely frustrated with Ms. Purcell.

Book Description

This collection of 24 papers, which encompasses the construction and the qualitative as well as quantitative properties of solutions of Volterra, Fredholm, delay, impulse integral and integro-differential equations in various spaces on bounded as well as unbounded intervals, will conduce and spur further research in this direction.

Customer Reviews:

Dreamy world!.......2004-03-27

How oft we remember dreaming - day dreams as a child and letting our imagination run wild! The Grimm's Fairy Tales are all *Five* Favourite Stars in my Read and Make Read collection in my Library. Some of my fav stories are:
1. Hansel & Gretel
2. Red Riding Hood
3. Snot White
4. Rumpelstiltskin
5. Cinderalla
6. Sleeping Beauty

Many More...you name it and these stories make your dreams sound true! Children love to read and listen. Even write reviews. This book is a famous collection of German Folk Tales by two brothers Jakob and Wilhelm Grimm. The first volume contained 86 tales and the second 70 and the last around 210 tales. The translations are perfect in this book and and took minute care to language details. The Grimms had taken pains to collect the tales mainly from friends and acquaintances who lived in and around a place called kassel in Germany and printed as expression of the spirit of german people. These retold stories with their own versions, the brothers have come out to suit public taste and their ideas about telling tales effectively. The translator Ralph Manheim has taken pains equally in translations! I recommend a 'Sure Sure Pick' whether one is a kid or a teen or even an Adult. Nothing like these stories will ever take you on a trip to wonderland! My Choice, of coz!

My first real taste of Grimms.......2003-07-31

Before this book, I had only known the juvenile -"G" rated versions of Grimms. As I had to read this for summer reading, I have to say, it's a bit of an eye opener. This book is great for analysis- you can see why my English teacher picked it (guess he thought we needed a challenge as we already speak English) One fault I do find is in the title: Grimms' Tales...for YOUNG and Old? I would not recomend anyone under the age of maybe thirteen to read this book. I doubt they would understand it very well.

Best Translation of Grimm.......2003-03-04

I've always loved fairy tales, and I've never found a better version of Grimm's Tales. Why? The translation! Other versions tend to gloss over the details, taking away from the richness (and occasionally, gruesomeness) of the original. Manheim stays true to the spirit of the work in his translation, and the character of the original really shines through.

The best example I can give is one of the stories -- "The Boy Who Left Home to Find Out About the Shivers." Other versions translate this as "The Boy who left home to find out what fear was." Why is this wrong? Well, the story is really about the physical effects of fear -- shivering. He didn't actually leave home to find out about fear itself. The gist of the story is that the main character never understood why his brother would "get the shivers" when he heard a scary story, so (among other reasons) he leaves home to seek his fortune. No matter what scary things he encounters, he never gets the shivers. Finally, at the end, the princess he married gets fed up with his whining about the shivers, and while he's sleeping, dumps a bucket of cold water full of minnows on him. He wakes up happy, saying "I'm shivering, I'm shivering!"

To this day, I use this story as a test of any translation of the Brothers Grimm.

Wonderful and accurate translation of the Grimms' Tales.......2000-12-28

What a great read! As an adult reading this to myself I am enjoying these tales! Contrary to what most people think these tales truly are meant for adult ears and are of interest to all ages.

Manheim explains that in early translations these were incorrectly labeled fairy tales and mistakenly assumed they were stories for children only. Over and over I am shocked by the gruesome content and punishments. Punishment by entrapping someone inside a barrel lined with the nail heads and then rolling them down a hill, father cutting off his daughters hands to avoid harm to himself, etc.

The reason I began reading these was to get a purist idea of what the Grimms' tales were: having grown up on the Disney version I was curious about the real thing. I was surprised at what I found, and happy! I was hoping to retell these stories to my 3 year-old but I have yet to find one that is tame enough to retell to him, but that is okay.

The storytelling nature of this is truly captured and I am entranced by these tales. The translator explains in his preface that this was the first time that the tales were translated from German to English by one person who was reading the original Grimms' manuscripts. This was first published in 1977. Manheim explains how earlier translations by other translators were muddled and errors made which changed some words, and at worst enough of the content was erroneous that the reader was really missing out on the true flavor and intent of the story. Manheim claims his edition is the most pure English translation. I compared this with my copy of the Pantheon edition edited by James Stern, as I was reading both copies at the same time. I found that the Manheim edition made more sense, that is, that some words were correctly translated to English while the other book had some words that I had just never heard of and could not understand. What fun to read these tales! Reading this book has been more fun than reading some recent fictional works. I have a renewed interest in reading about the old folk tales and fables now. Indulge yourself and read this book!

Great Collection of original work.......2000-11-14

This book contains the stories and fairy tales presented by the Brothers Grimm in their original form (translated from German). There are 210 tales in this book, and some of the more well known of these stories include: Snow White, Cinderella, Sleeping Beauty, Hansel & Gretel, Rumpelstiltskin, Rapunzel.... And the list goes on.

Books:

Books Index

Books Home

Recommended Books