Bottom Line: This e-book (viewed through the iBooks app) includes stunning photographs and a wealth of information about the Grand Canyon, told through the voice of a dog, a California condor, and a squirrel. Text heavy, so read along with younger kids. Worth the money just for the spectacular photos!
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I have to start this review by saying most of my e-book experience comes through individual apps, not e-books available through iBooks. But as I just finished visiting the Grand Canyon with my family, I jumped at the chance to review this book.
Mysteries of the Grand Canyon by Marie von Minden features incredible
photographs of the amazing
Grand Canyon National Park — and though the dog
narrator, Kristi Kay, is cute, the photographs really are the star of the show.
Kristi Kay goes on an adventure with a California condor named Alex and an Abert’s squirrel named Gerri. I admit I felt the anthropomorphizing of the animal characters was a bit stilted — Kristi Kay says things like, “I am certainly a well traveled Cairn Terrier,” and “Never in my whole life have I seen anything this majestic!” Not exactly what I'd call natural dialogue, if there such a thing as natural dialogue for a dog. My 11-year-old read it with me the first time, and he also found the text a little stilted. But when I read it with my 5-year-old, she didn’t care at all.
The book is at about a 6th grade reading level, with vocabulary to match. That makes it ideal to read aloud to younger kids, as it’s very important that kids hear books above their
reading level on a frequent basis. Though kids will likely enjoy looking at the photographs, it’s probably best
enjoyed as a shared reading experience for kids ages 4-10. Kids ages 11-14 may also
enjoy the specific information about the Grand Canyon, but will likely find the
story itself a bit silly.
My 11-year-old enjoyed the photos and information in the app, though he did note that one of the explanations of the Grand Canyon in the book was a bit simplified. His direct quote was, “Well, I guess that’s a bit simplified of an explanation, since Kristi Kay is a dog.”
The information that follows the story is almost
more valuable than the story itself. It includes
information about the Grand Canyon
from the National Park Service, including photos and videos. The information
matched what we learned as recent visitors to the park, and in fact surpassed
what I knew about California condors.
Kids who have visited the Grand Canyon will likely enjoy the information in this book, along with the great photos to remember. Kids who haven’t visited will enjoy it just the same, and perhaps get inspired to visit one of our national parks. A family planning a trip to the Grand Canyon will find the book invaluable — not only will it help children complete their Junior Ranger books quickly, but it will also help them appreciate and relate to what they see on their trip.
Those unfamiliar with e-books should note that this is
different from many book apps — the text
is not read aloud while words are highlighted, and while there are some slight
interactive elements, it’s more an expansion of a photo scene than true
interaction. In other words, it's truly an e-book, not a storybook app. It's important to note that the book is priced like an e-book, too — $7.99 is definitely a higher price than we typically see on a storybook app.
The words can be defined by highlighting them (use a double tap to highlight), and notes can be added to each page, too. In this way, the book could even be used as a trip journal. When various birds are sighted in the park, for instance, a note about where they were seen and the date could be added.
Overall, we loved reading the book and remembering our
experience at the Grand Canyon. We hiked
some of the trail that Kristi Kay
traveled, and though we didn’t get to the bottom to see the Colorado River and
the ancient ruins, we enjoyed seeing pictures.
I did have some difficulty with the navigation of this book, but as my experience with e-books is limited, I don't know if my experience is typical. It took me a while to figure out how to navigate between chapters. I also felt like the interactive elements were too slow. Some were detailed and added to the story, but others didn't add more information, and it was hard to know when the interaction was complete.
I also felt that while the vocabulary was great, some of the sentence structure was overly stilted and formal for a kids' book. I appreciate complexity in books read aloud to kids, but this one sometimes bordered on silly. However, as mentioned, my daughter surely didn't care. But in a book that I have to read aloud, I want it to be pleasurable to read for me, too.
This book is more expensive than most book apps we see, but as I said, it needs to be judged somewhat differently, as it is not intended to be as interactive or to have the text read aloud — rather, it is an electronic presentation of a book. The information contained within this app is vast — almost as vast as the Grand Canyon itself. And of course, the photographs are amazing. First in a planned series, I look forward to more Kristi Kay books — and I hope they're ready in time for our next family vacation!
***
This is not a picture of Heather. It is, however, something Heather saw on her recent trip to the Grand Canyon. Does he know Kristi Kay, too? SmartAppsForKids.com was paid a priority review fee to complete this review in an expedited manner.
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