National Geographic Desert Animals, Animals in their Habitats, by June Randolph - Information Text

I teach about the different habitats in the third grade, and this year my goal was to introduce the different habitats with a read aloud, each day. When I began talking about the desert habitat, I of course decided to read The Three Little Javalinas to my class, because it does a cute little fractured fairytale version of the desert animals, people, and plants. Unfortunately, at the time I was not as interested in nonfiction as I am now (thank you Dr. Johnson), so I had not acquired the book that I am about to write about. However, rest assured, I will be using this National Geographic Desert Animals nonfiction book as a read aloud from here on out (along with The Three Little Javalinas, because I just love that book!).

National Geographic Desert Animals is a fabulous nonfiction book that looks very similar to a National Geographic magazine, only with child readers in mind. The words are student friendly and it offers a lot of pictures and captions to show the desert (both cold and hot), it’s animals, and plants. The book is also useful for teaching text features (glossary, index, table of contexts, bold words, captions, etc.) because it has all of those. I would be able to use this with students who are reading below grade level in their third grade in a buddy reading or independent reading group. I have noticed so many times that my learning disabled and lower readers love to read nonfiction. I think one of the reasons is because it shows pictures (attracting their interest), has leading titles (keeping their interest), and breaks the information up into little segments and parts (allowing for scaffolding along the way). National Geographic doesn’t stop with just the desert, however, either. They have Forest Animals, Ocean Animals, and Rain Forest Animals. What a nice plethora for my use next year!

Science is fascinating to children and if they like the animal or habitat, they will most likely read the nonfiction book that teaches them more about that animal and habitat. Even I am pulled into the works of these books, learning right along with the children about animals and their interesting body parts that help them to adapt to their environment.