middle grade Archives - Page 150 of 366

It Takes Guts: How Your Body Turns Food Into Fuel (and Poop)
by Dr. Jennifer Gardy (Author) and Belle Wuthrich (Illustrator)
@ Amazon | Bookshop | IndieBound

Booktalk: A science-based resource for classroom learning and home-schooling for kids age 9 to 13, with information about:

The surprising role that food and digestion play in your mood and immune system.
The amazing tools your body uses to break down food including acids, which do their thing without burning a hole in your stomach!
The incredible truth that not all bacteria is bad! Billions of “helpful bacteria” belong in your gut.
And so much more.

Snippet: Microbes can even influence our mood! We’ve already seen how our gut talks to our brain through nerves and hormones, and it turns out that these conversations can be influenced by our resident microbes. In one study, researchers gave one group of healthy volunteers milk or yogurt enriched with friendly Bifidobacterium and Lactobacillus bacteria every day for 30 days. The other group was given a placebo–a pill that did nothing. At the end of the month, the group that took the bacterial pill reported fewer bad moods and stressful moments, and they were producing less cortisol–a hormone produced when you’re under stress–than they were at the start of the experiment.

It’s STEM Friday! (STEM is Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics)

Sisters of the Neversea
by Cynthia Leitich Smith (Author)
@ Amazon | Bookshop | IndieBound

Booktalk: In this Indigenous retelling of Peter Pan, twelve-year-old stepsisters (Muscogee Creek) Lily and (English) Wendy embark on a high-flying journey of magic, adventure, and courage to a fairy-tale island known as Neverland . . .

Lily and Wendy have been best friends since they became stepsisters. But with their feuding parents planning to spend the summer apart, what will become of their family–and their friendship?

Little do they know that a mysterious boy has been watching them from the oak tree outside their window. A boy who intends to take them away from home for good, to an island of wild animals, Merfolk, Fairies, and kidnapped children, to a sea of merfolk, pirates, and a giant crocodile.

A boy who calls himself Peter Pan.

Snippet: Belle had tasked herself with quickly categorizing Human children so they could be properly distributed, but this family confused her. Yes, of course Belle had studied Peter’s old storybooks as a guide. But the illustrations never matched up with real-life humans.

“What do you mean by ‘we’?” Lily asked. “Who’s with you?

Belle replied with a question of her own. “What are you, Lost or Indian?”

Not surprisingly, the questions struck Lily as terribly rude, intrusive, and presumptuous.

“We’re Creek!” Michael explained. “Muscogee. Muscogee Creek.”

“Is that a ‘yes’ for Indian then?” Belle inquired.

“Yeah.” Pointing to Lily, Michael said, “Me and that Sissy.” Pointing to Wendy, he added, “Not that Sissy.”