Melissa Stewart
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Pump It Up!

The Secrets of the Heart and Blood

Pump It Up!

by Melis­sa Stewart

Bench­mark Books, 2010

for Grades 3 to 5

ISBN 978–0‑76144–164‑9

Pur­chase this book at your local inde­pen­dent book­seller or Amazon.com.

The live­ly, con­ver­sa­tion­al tone and blend of pho­tos and car­toon-style art make Pump It Up: The Secrets of the Heart and Blood a per­fect blend of fun facts and seri­ous sci­ence learn­ing about the human body as well as the bod­ies of oth­er crea­tures. Here at last—a book that’s irrev­er­ent enough to cap­ti­vate young read­ers, yet author­i­ta­tive enough to win the praise of teach­ers, librar­i­ans, and parents.

Honors and Awards

  • Soci­ety of Children’s Book Writ­ers and Illustrator/Anna Cross Gib­lin Non­fic­tion Research Grant

Reviews

“In addi­tion to the fas­ci­nat­ing triv­ia, this title con­tains a chart com­par­ing ani­mals heart rates (bpm) and their aver­age life span (years). Won­der­ful for high­er lev­el think­ing and using math, log­ic, and rea­son­ing. This would be a per­fect page to dis­play …d blue-bloods? I know after read­ing this title.” (School Library Jour­nal’s Prac­ti­cal­ly Par­adise blog)

“The Gross and Goofy Body [series of books] enlivens phys­i­ol­o­gy for kids, offer­ing humor­ous yet sci­en­tif­ic sur­veys of body func­tions in just under 50 pages each. Kids in grades 2–4 will find [these books] appeal­ing and fun. Each blends pho­tos with fun car­toons and pho­tos of kids, along with plen­ty of basic phys­i­ol­o­gy.” (Chil­dren’s Book­watch)

“Despite its irrev­er­ent moniker, the Gross and Goofy Body series offers detailed sci­ence facts in a fash­ion approach­able enough to make it a wel­come sup­ple­ment to school text­books. Each vol­ume takes on a part or func­tion of the body and then goes through the paces of descrip­tion, metaphor, exam­ples, data, and, most exten­sive­ly, com­par­i­son to our ani­mal coun­ter­parts. … the lay­out is fresh, clean, and col­or­ful, side­bars keep things con­ver­sa­tion­al, and the back mat­ter is sol­id.” (Book­list)

Behind the Book

“While I was work­ing on this book, I received some fan­tas­tic news. The Soci­ety of Children’s Book Writ­ers and Illus­tra­tors award­ed me a research grant to help fund my work on this series. It allowed me to dig even deep­er for all kinds of great infor­ma­tion. I scoured the library at a near­by med­ical school and read dozens of jour­nal articles.

“When I’m research­ing, I always keep my eyes and ears open for ideas, and it’s a good thing. One day, I heard a fas­ci­nat­ing show on Nation­al Pub­lic Radio. It was all about the sur­pris­ing link between body size, heart rate, and life span.”

Series at a Glance

You’ll also enjoy …

Gross and Goofy Body

Blasts of Gas
The Eyes Have It
Germ Wars!
Give Me a Hand
Here We Grow
It's Spit-acular!
Moving and Grooving
Now Hear This
Pump It Up!
The Skin You're In
Up Your Nose
You've Got Nerve!
Pump It Up!

by Melis­sa Stewart

Bench­mark Books, 2010

for Grades 3 to 5

ISBN 978–0‑76144–164‑9

Pur­chase this book at your local inde­pen­dent book­seller or Amazon.com.