CM Volume 1 Number 12

Volume 1 Number 12

September 1, 1995

Table of Contents

Book Reviews

SADAKO Teachers' Guide.
Naomi Watkins.
Review by Elinor M. Kelly.
Grades 4 - 7 / Ages 8 - 12.

Wild in the City.
Jan Thornhill.
Review by Harriet Zaidman.
Grades K - 3 / Ages 5 - 9

Clayoquot and Dissent.
Essays by Tzeporah Berman, et al.
Review by Adele Case.
Grades 10 - 13 / Ages 14 - Adult.

A Year of Crafts for Children and Adults.
Geraldine Hartman.
Review by Lorraine Douglas.
Adult Level.

Video Review

The Living Beach.
Review by Lorrie Andersen.
Grades 7 - 13 / Ages 11 - Adult.

CM Editor
Duncan Thornton

CM Executive Assistant
Peter Tittenberger

Book Review

SADAKO Teachers' Guide.

Naomi Watkins.
Victoria, B.C.: Pacific-Rim Publishers, 1995. 25pp, paper, $9.95
ISBN 0-921358-23-7.

Grades 4 - 7 / Ages 8 - 12.
Review by Elinor M. Kelly.

Sadako is the well-known classic about the little girl who lived in Hiroshima when the bomb was dropped. Sadako developed leukemia and began folding origami paper-cranes, in the hope that if she could finish one thousand cranes she would survive -- but died before she could complete her task.

This teacher's guide for Sadako (which itself is available in different, inexpensive editions) presents twelve activity sheets to teach students about Japanese customs -- from their beds to their religion, haiku poetry, and so on -- and about the atomic bomb: the facts and the rights and wrongs.

This is a timely book given that this summer has seen the fiftieth anniversary of the dropping of the bomb, and it provides useful guidelines for discussion of the subject by children.

Sadako and her classmates, who folded the rest of her cranes after her death and raised the money for her statue in Hiroshima, are famous throughout Japan and to travellers world-wide. The crane has become a symbol not only of long life but of peace. If this guide helps to present the subject and encourage useful discussion, it's well worth its price.

Recommended.

Elinor M. Kelly is a retired librarian who lives in Port Hope, Ontario.

Book Review

Wild in the City.

Jan Thornhill.
Toronto: Owl Books, 1995. 32pp, cloth, $14.95.
Distributed by Firefly Books.
ISBN 1-895688-33-7

Grades K - 3 / Ages 5 - 9.
Review by Harriet Zaidman.

excerpt:

Jenny's mother is tucking her in when Jenny hears a soft ``churr, churr, churr" coming through the open window.

So opens Jan Thornhill's urban adventure story about the wild animals that are our neighbours. This is a lovely book, which can be used as a non-fiction resource, but which also tells a good story. Wild animals have adapted to an environment created by humans, and the marvels of their adaptation can be seen at any time of the day or night.

The story begins at dusk, as Jenny goes to sleep, just as the raccoons come out for a night of foraging. The story of one animal leads to the next, through the night-time activity of bats and skunks, and around the clock to more conventional animals, such as squirrels, robins, and so on. The book is beautifully illustrated, as readers who have read Thornhill's other works, Wildlife 123, Wildlife ABC, A Tree in the Forest, and Crow and Fox and Other Legends, will expect. The colours are rich and the drawings strong and intriguing. She has captured Canadian neighbourhoods in the pictures of the houses. The animals are appealing, but not overly anthropomorphized. She has also included a puzzle that has a clue in each picture.

This book would be a useful addition to a classroom or library collection, and is an admirable addition to the body of Canadian children's literature.

Highly recommended.

Harriet Zaidman is a Winnipeg teacher/librarian.

Book Review

Clayoquot and Dissent.

Essays by Tzeporah Berman, et al.
Vancouver: Ronsdale Press, 1994. 219pp, paper.
ISBN 0-921-870-29-9.

Grades 10 - 13 / Ages 14 - Adult.
Review by Adele Case.

excerpt:

Canadian scientists are now addressing the problems of clearcutting head on. Environment Canada's 1995 report on ``Biodiversity in British Columbia" states unequivocally that clearcutting causes a ``loss in biodiversity" and warns that this may have ``economic and social, as well as ecological repercussions." The Federal government scientists go on to say that ``Modern methods of partial cutting can be selected and designed to maintain the structural attributes of old-growth forest, wildlife habitat, or other non-timber values. However . . . about 90% of the harvested forests . . . are clear-cut."
The Clayoquot Sound Science Panel has already recommended a shift to ``ecosystem management," the buzzword of the recent American developments, as well as an avoidance of the practice of clearcutting.

Clayoquot and Dissent is a collection of essays and background information about past, present, and possible future logging practices followed in Clayoquot Sound and many other West-Coast logging sites. The book chronicles issues that had been simmering for years before boiling over in the protests of 1992 -- issues that concerned not only environmentalists, citizens, and educators, but also a number of tribal communities on the ocean side of Vancouver Island.

Many West-Coast ``sounds" (inlet-like arms of the sea) are inaccessible by road, and contain a complex patchwork of remote islands, which in the past were carelessly logged using clear-cut methods. With a clear-cut, the marketable logs are removed en masse, and brush, slash, or unmarketable small trees are left on the steep hillsides to dry, allowing the winter and spring rains to wash away the thin topsoil. Little thought was given to the effect of clear-cutting on spawning streams for fish, or to the preservation of rare trees, plants, birds, or small animals.

Clayoquot and Dissent carefully lists the attempts of activists and others to change these practices between 1979 and 1994 -- attempts made in the face of essentially unjust imprisonment, fines, and punishment directed against those who dared protest the methods used by powerful forest companies. Throughout this soft-cover book, beautiful illustrations by Marguerite Gibbons also show the emotional impact the virtual ``rape" of the hillsides has had on many who value the beauty of nature.

Throughout that time, public alarm over environmental problems like disappearance of teak from Thailand and the ruination of the rain forest in Brazil and Central America drew more attention to the need to preserve forested areas in Canada as well. Here in B.C. that attention grew only gradually (glacially slowly, some would argue), but it inevitably came to a head in a confrontation at the Kennedy River bridge. The sight of hundreds of demonstrators being hauled away created national and international interest in B.C.'s silviculture, logging and fishing regulations, community politics, and diminishing natural resources.

This is a small book considering the range and importance of the issues it treats, but it will be an invaluable reference for those who wish to study the effects of valuing profit over protection. Some of the essays are legalistic, dense with references and daunting to read, but nonetheless they manage to challenge the reader to weigh the ``company view" and the rule of law that has protected it against the fears of environmentalists that a fragile ecosystem may be damaged beyond repair.

Clayoquot and Dissent closes with black and white pictures of eroded riverbanks, creeks logged to the water's edge, and stream banks degraded by heavy equipment. The pictures are sobering, especially in light of the books' repeated warning that the area within the Clayoquot Sound forest boundaries is still being logged ``with practices that have been banned in much of the world."

Any reader or class interested in the issues of the preservation of British Columbia's forest ecology, or the rights of loggers, should check and consider the questions raised in this book.

Highly recommended, to interested readers.

Adele Case is a high-school teacher who lives in West Vancouver.

Book Review

A Year of Crafts for Children and Adults.

Geraldine Hartman.
Regina: The Leader Post Carrier Foundation, Inc., 1994. 112pp, coil bound with paper covers, $12.95.
ISBN 1-895292-47-6.

Adult Level.
Review by Lorraine Douglas.

excerpt:

Valentine Sweets Treasure Box

For 15 large hazelnut clusters (yummy!). Note: if you are too young to use the stove, get an older brother or sister or a parent to help. (Don't do this part alone.)

Geraldine Hartman writes two craft columns for the Regina Sun and many of her columns have been used for this book. Each two-page spread features one project for children and one for adults for each week of the year. There are accompanying black and white photographs of the finished project, instructions, and materials lists.

The ideas intended for children really need adult assistance as the projects require more skills than are outlined in the instructions. For example, in the ``pasta frame mirror" project, the author suggests drawing pencil lines to centre the mirror. Children need more specific instructions and step-by-step drawings would have been helpful. No age level is indicated for the children's crafts. For instance, in the fluffy chicks project the author suggests that ``if you are making chicks for a young child, do NOT use the pins for eyes." What is a young child? Why not use the pins? No explanations are given. There is also subtle sexism in the book. The wooden kid's bird house is ``a great project for you and your dad to make together!" but with the New Year's Resolution chart you should ``get Mom to help with the sewing."

Adults looking for simple projects using materials found around the house might find this book useful. But children would find it difficult to use on their own without adult supervision.

Not recommended.

Lorraine Douglas is Youth Services Coordinator for the Winnipeg Public Library.

Video Review

The Living Beach.

Needham Gate Productions Ltd., 1994. VHS, 48 minutes.
Distributed by:

Needham Gate Productions Ltd.,
P.O.Box 105, Falmouth, Nova Scotia, BOP 1L0 (902) 798-8777.

Grades 7 - 13 / Ages 11 - Adult
Review by Lorrie Andersen.

The Living Beach is a well-constructed video useful in several curricular applications, including geography, language arts, environmental studies, science, and social studies. The film covers the topic of beaches from many angles: it interweaves commentary, excerpts from famous pieces of literature, expert opinions from various viewpoints, and glimpses of serious and playful uses of the beach, with the story of human successes and failures in managing the waterfront.

With this video the viewer learns that even though it may shift and change position, the beach remains the same; ``beach erosion" should really be called ``shoreline retreat." Even though the video shows examples of engineering feats in, near, and around the water, the production makes the point that in the end we have to let the beach do what it wants to do, because attempts at engineering are ultimately expensive and ineffective.

The beach moves and shifts by the action of storm and wave. Human interaction with the beach comes with management schemes such as the Sebastian Inlet Commission, which successfully manages an environmentally sensitive area in Florida. The Living Beach also shows (with the aid of diagrams) what sea walls accomplish in preserving the beach -- as opposed to soft solutions that involve replenishing the sediments that the oceans have redistributed.

Between 70 and 80 percent of Americans live within a one- or two-hour drive to ocean or Great Lakes beaches. The resulting pressures on this natural resource are intense, coming from recreational, residential, industrial, and commercial demands. The Living Beach ends with the comment that these beaches are sacred areas -- things we can destroy but cannot create.

There are serious messages here, but also delightful quotes from literature, ranging from Shakespeare to Robinson Crusoe, with dashes from Mathew Arnold, Homer, Lord Byron, and even the famous Second World War German field marshal Erwin Rommel. And there are tidbits of useless, but nice-to-know information such as the ancient law in Greenland regarding beachcombing. There's something on beaches for all tastes here!

Although the producer is Canadian, the content is slanted almost entirely to the United States, except for an example of an eroding drumlin (a mound of glacial drift) in Nova Scotia, and the discussion on the role of summer cottage life as a place for inter-generational family interaction.

The Living Beach is not ideal for classroom use because of its length, but it would be a good purchase where there is a need for materials on ``the way beaches grow and shrink and change" and about ``the human relationship with beaches -- why we love them, how we harm them, and how they can harm us."


Recommended.

A librarian by training, Lorrie Andersen is Collection Development Consultant, Instructional Resources, for Manitoba Education and Training.

Copyright © 1995 the Manitoba Library Association. Reproduction for personal use is permitted only if this copyright notice is maintained. Any other reproduction is prohibited without permission.

Published by
The Manitoba Library Association
ISSN 1201-9364

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