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African penguins waddle around nesting colonies in lower numbers than ever before. Despite South African government efforts to protect the penguin colonies and their ocean fish supply, young penguins ...
African penguins waddle around nesting colonies in lower numbers than ever before. Despite South African government efforts to protect the penguin colonies and their ocean fish supply, young penguins still struggle to survive. Fuzzy chicks waiting for food in open nests may overheat in the sun or become prey. Others simply may not get enough food to survive on their own once their parents leave. But new conservation methods, including rescuing and hand-feeding vulnerable chicks, are giving experts hope. Can volunteers and scientists help save Africa's only penguins before it's too late?
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Lerner Interactive Books introduce students to knowledge areas in core grade-level curriculum in an engaging format. With titles that span curriculum themes from pre-K - 5th grade, Lerner Interactive Books give readers a digital option for reading that allows them to read, hear, and interact in a way that will engage and motivate them to read more and more often. It's a fast path to deepening students' love of reading and learning.
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From the opening page, audio and visual cues and easy-to-use tools help guide your students through the story. As the story begins, words are highlighted while they're read aloud. This type of word distinction better supports letter and word recognition skills, and keeps kids focused on the structure of how to read. |
System Requirements
Lerner Interactive Books are delivered via the Internet under a single-user license. Additional licensing options are available upon request.
The following technical specifications are required to implement Lerner Interactive Books in a school or public library:
- * T1 Connection or higher at building level (minimum); T3 Connection or higher at building level (recommended)
- * Adobe Flash Player 9.0 or higher installed on each computer that will access Lerner Interactive Books (free download from Adobe)
- * Screen resolution adjusted to 1024 x 768 or higher (1440 x 900 recommended)
- * Recommended monitor screen size: 17" or higher
- * Speakers or headsets
- * Microsoft Windows XP
- * Intel Celeron 2.0 GHz CPU
- * 512 MB RAM
- * 100 MB Free Disk Space (Browser Cache)
- * 128 MB Graphics Card
- * Microsoft Internet Explorer 7.0
- * Firefox 3.0
- * Sound Card
- * Mac OSX v.10.4
- * Power PC G5 or Intel processor
- * 512 MB RAM
- * 100 MB Free Disk Space
- * 128 MB Graphics Card
- * Firefox 3.0
- * Safari 3
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Author Biography, Author's Note, Full-Color Photographs, Further Reading, Glossary, Index, Maps, Primary Source Quotations, Sidebars, Source Notes, Timeline, Websites
Author Biography, Author's Note, Full-Color Photographs, Further Reading, Glossary, Index, Maps, Primary Source Quotations, Sidebars, Source Notes, Timeline, Websites
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Sandra Markle is the author of numerous award-winning books for children. A former elementary science teacher, she is a nationally-known science education consultant.
Markle has received many honors for her series Animal Predators, Animal Scavengers, and Animal Prey. Several titles have been named as National Science Teachers Association (NSTA)/Children’s Book Council (CBC) Outstanding Science Trade Books for Students K-12, and Animal Predators was honored as a Top 10 Youth Nonfiction Series by Booklist.
Markle is also the author of the Insect World series and several single titles. Her book Rescues! was named a Best Book by the Society of School Librarians International and a Recommended Title of Outstanding Nonfiction by the National Council of Teachers of English’s (NCTE) Orbis Pictus Award committee; Animal Heroes was named a 2008 Lasting Connections title by Book Links.
Markle lives in Lakewood Ranch, Florida with her husband, photographer Skip Jeffery.
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Booklist Top 10 Sci-Tech Books for Youth | Junior Library Guild Selection | NSTA/CBC Outstanding Science Trade Books for Students K-12 | |
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Booklist
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"[W]ell-chosen photos appear on every page of the book and illustrate the text very effectively. . . . A vivid introduction to African penguins, their remarkable rescue, and their still precarious existence."—starred, Booklist
"In this companion book to The Great Leopard Rescue: Saving the Amur Leopards (2016) and The Great Monkey Rescue: Saving the Golden Lion Tamarins (2015), Markle discusses the two-century decline of African penguins. First, the guano that sheltered their nests was taken for fertilizer. Next, their eggs were stolen and sold for food. Modern fishing practices decimated their food supplies and, more recently, climate change has shifted their feeding grounds farther out to sea. The book's dramatic focus is the extraordinary response to a catastrophic oil spill off the coast of South Africa in 2000, when an astonishing 45,000 volunteers helped rescue the penguins by cleaning oil from their feathers, from the ocean, and from the beaches where they live, as well as moving whole penguin colonies and caring for abandoned chicks. A dependable science writer for kids, Markle offers a lucid, well-organized text, telling a story that is engaging as well as informative. Drawn from many sources, well-chosen photos appear on every page of the book and illustrate the text very effectively. As few creatures are as photogenic as penguins or adorable as their chicks, the illustrations also heighten interest the birds' plight. A vivid introduction to African penguins, their remarkable rescue, and their still precarious existence."—starred, Booklist
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Kirkus Reviews
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"Smoothly written and beautifully presented, another stellar animal conservation tale."—starred, Kirkus Reviews
"Scientists use varied approaches to rescue and restore a dwindling penguin population in South Africa and Namibia. Penguins are birds Markle has studied and written about before, and they make an ideal subject for this companion to her accounts of conservation efforts for Brazil's golden lion tamarins and Russia's snow leopards. The stories are similar. The penguin species called African penguins nest on beaches and islands in the southwestern part of that continent. Once numbering in the millions, their population was greatly reduced due to human harvesting of the guano in which they dug their nests, the eggs they laid, and the fish they ate. Climate change and oil spills have also taken their tolls. From the opening focus on a hopeful, hungry, apparently abandoned chick to the final pages describing its rescue and return, readers will be enthralled by this relatively optimistic, though still evolving, story, which is enhanced by solid backmatter. The text is smoothly written. Clear, concise explanations show how human actions have led these birds to the edge of extinction and how humans now work to help: protecting nesting and fishing grounds, rescuing and relocating oiled birds, and even hatching, rearing, and returning chicks to the wild. The thoughtful design gives prominence to the irresistible photographs from many different photographers. Smoothly written and beautifully presented, another stellar animal conservation tale."—starred, Kirkus Reviews
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The Bulletin of the Center for Children's Books
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"Markle's unanthropomorphized opening scene is a powerful entree into the plight of African penguins. . . . Exceptionally well-organized text leads readers through the reasons for endangerment . . ."—The Bulletin of the Center for Children's Books
"Few can resist reacting with an 'aww!' when faced with a baby penguin, and the utterance becomes especially sympathetic when said penguin is a fluffy three-month-old waiting in vain for her parents to return from sea with her next meal. Markle's unanthropomorphized opening scene is a powerful entree into the plight of African penguins, once numbering in the millions and now reduced to thousands, that colonize Africa's southernmost coast. Exceptionally well-organized text leads readers through the reasons for endangerment, such as guano and egg harvesting, commercial fishing practices, and a massive fuel spill in 2000 from a passing cargo ship. Examined also are the efforts that have helped stabilize but haven't turned the situation around (artificial nests, fishing restrictions) and two current programs to rescue and return abandoned fledglings to their home (or even new) colonies, which look promising at present. That brings Markle back to the abandoned chick at the title's opening, as rescue workers help her regain strength, adapt to the presence of other penguins, and hopefully survive and thrive upon release into a new colony. Readers who face nonfiction with that deer-in-the-headlights look will appreciate layout features that guide them through the text. Markle's narration is clearly boxed in aqua spaces while close-up photographs of penguins and their tenders invite leisurely inspection; a map, timeline, source notes, glossary, index, and list of child-friendly resources are included."—The Bulletin of the Center for Children's Books
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School Library Journal
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"Markle delivers another compelling story of wildlife conservation efforts that deserves a place in most collections."—School Library Journal
"Markle continues her series of books about efforts to save endangered species, this time focusing on the plight of penguin colonies along the coast of Namibia and South Africa. She deftly incorporates information about the penguins' life cycle into her examination of factors that led to a disastrous population drop from an estimated four million adults in the 1800s to about 50,000 in 2010. Humans removed guano from nesting sites, ate eggs, and overfished feeding areas. Also, warming oceans forced adults to swim farther for food. However, the greatest threat came in 2000, when a sinking ore carrier released a massive oil spill during breeding season. Markle documents how thousands of volunteers cleaned oil-coated birds and transported others to safety. She describes ongoing efforts of the Southern African Foundation for the Conservation of Coastal Birds (SANCCOB) to increase African penguin numbers by raising orphaned chicks, hatching abandoned eggs, and exploring possible sites for a new colony. She neither minimizes the major difficulties nor ignores SANCCOB's steady accomplishments. Numerous photos accompany the engaging text and may surprise readers accustomed to seeing penguins against snowy landscapes instead of sandy beaches. Clare Hibbert's Penguin Rescue uses some of the same stock photos to illustrate a less detailed presentation of SANCCOB's work. VERDICT Markle delivers another compelling story of wildlife conservation efforts that deserves a place in most collections."—School Library Journal
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