This title focuses on the history of Football and gives information related to its origins, fun facts, and superstars like Tom Brady. This hi-lo title is complete with epic and colorful photographs, simple text, glossary, and an index. Aligned to Common Core Standards and correlated to state standards. Fly! is an imprint of Abdo Zoom, a division of ABDO.
November 1, 2019
Gr 2 Up-Get ready to sprint through the history of sports in this speedy series. With heavily simplified information, Abdo briefly outlines how each game is played and paints a quick picture of its history before launching into fun facts about powerhouse players and recent championship-winning teams. Ample photos and small text blocks in a sizable font make it reasonably good for readalouds. The brevity means that some important information gets left out, like the segregation of baseball. Still, for many of the sports, both male and female professional athletes are included in the "Big Show" highlights of dominant athletes. It could be a fine early reader series, but the vocabulary doesn't support its use by beginning readers. Instead, it would work best as an introductory text in a sports-themed storytime or classroom unit. VERDICT Despite lots of pictures to lure readers, this series is little more than a benchwarmer.
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