Africa for Kids (eBook)

Exploring a Vibrant Continent, 19 Activities

Harvey Croze (Autor)

eBook Download: PDF

2007 | 1. Auflage
144 Seiten
Chicago Review Press (Verlag)
978-1-55652-703-6 (ISBN)

Infos

Africa is brought to life in this imaginative look at the plants, animals, and people that make it such a fascinating continent. Studies of both traditional tribes and modern African cities showcase Africa's diversity, and authentic activities allow kids to dive into the rich culture by making a Maasai bivouac shelter, writing a fable in the African style, working as a field biologist, making a ritual elephant mask, and learning to tie an African Kanga dress. This cross-cultural study also shows kids what challenges Africa faces today while giving them a look at what it is like to live on this interesting continent.

Textauszug

The Pyramid of Life: The Big Picture

Life may appear to be endlessly complicated, withmillions of species of animals and even more speciesof plants. But, in fact, the underlying relationshipsare really quite simple. Plants grow in the soil withthe help of water and sunlight, herbivores eat plants,carnivores eat herbivores, scavengers are omnivoresand eat plants, herbivores, and carnivores, parasiteseat everyone. And when all of them die, they alldecompose back into the soil. All of this voraciouseating results in what is called the 'pyramid of life.'Lots of plants are at the bottom, a good number ofherbivores are in the middle, a few carnivores are atthe top, and scavengers and parasites crawl aroundthe whole lot.

Ecologists use the term 'ecosystem' to describethe collection of plants and animals in a particularlocation, all fed by the energy of the sun and thenutrients from the soil. Within an ecosystem, allplants and animals on land are rained on from aboveby the same local weather and nourished by waterfrom below by the same lakes, rivers, and undergroundsprings.

One way of picturing an ecosystem and how itworks is to imagine a tag attached to one atom of anelement that makes up the basic building blocks oflife, like carbon. Carbon is everywhere and is indispensableto life. Carbon atoms chain together andbond with other atoms to make all of the organicchemicals of life itself, from DNA to toenails.

So imagine that there is a traceable tag on a carbonatom that was blown out of Ol Donyo Lengai,the last active volcano in East Africa, when it lasterupted in 1957. The atom is blown by the prevailingwind to the west, where it mingles with a rainstormand is deposited as a dissolved salt into thesoils of the famous Serengeti Plain in Tanzania.

Grass grows so fast in the African sun just afterthe rainy season that you can almost see it grow, halfan inch a day. So it does not take long for the taggedcarbon atom to be absorbed by a grass root andbecome part of the cell wall in a leaf. If it is the timeof the great Serengeti migration, when a millionwildebeests and thousands of gazelles and zebras trekacross the plains and through the woodlands lookingfor fresh grass, there is a good chance that a passing wildebeest will eat the leaf. The carbon atom is amongmany others that get chewed, swallowed, and digestedby a wildebeest and become a part of the animal.

Life then gets exciting for the atom. The wildebeestis cut off from its herd and run down by a packof African wild dogs. The wild dog, with its colorfulblotches and big ears, looks harmless, even comical.It is also much smaller than a wildebeest, smallereven than a German shepherd. But wild dogs huntingin a pack can attack and tear apart a wildebeestin a matter of minutes.

So the dogs eat the wildebeest, but the chunk ofmeat with the carbon atom in it is stolen by a jackal,who is chased off by a large vulture, who gulps downthe meat before the jackal can retaliate. In a fewhours the vulture leaves some droppings containingthe carbon atom a few miles away. A soil bacteriumabsorbs the atom and excretes it back into the soil asan organic molecule or an inorganic salt. It is notlong before another plant takes up the atom, and offit goes again on the big merry-go-round of life.

Produkt-Details

• Erscheint lt. Verlag: 1.4.2007
• Sprache: englisch
• Themenwelt: Literatur
• Themenwelt: Sachbuch/Ratgeber
• Themenwelt: Reisen ► Reiseführer
• Themenwelt: Kinder- / Jugendbuch ► Jugendbücher ab 12 Jahre
• Themenwelt: Kinder- / Jugendbuch ► Sachbücher
• Themenwelt: Kinder- / Jugendbuch ► Spielen / Lernen
• Themenwelt: Geisteswissenschaften
• Themenwelt: Sozialwissenschaften ► Pädagogik
• ISBN-10: 1-55652-703-9 / 1556527039
• ISBN-13: 978-1-55652-703-6 / 9781556527036