How to Change Everything: The Young Human’s Guide to Protecting the Planet and Each Other
by Rebecca Stefoff and Naomi Klein
Ages 10 and up
Even though climate change is a dire problem, there is hope and there is room for everyone, no matter their age in the movement to address it. This is a hopeful and empowering book, grounded in real-life stories of success and action.
Issues Covered: Activism, Climate Change, Social Justice
How We Know What We Know About Our Changing Climate: Scientists and Kids Explore Global Warming
by Lynne Cherry
Ages: 11 and up
When the weather changes daily, how do we really know that Earth’s climate is changing? Here is the science behind the headlines – evidence from flowers, butterflies, birds, frogs, trees, glaciers and much more, gathered by scientists from all over the world, sometimes with assistance from young “citizen-scientists.” And here is what young people, and their families and teachers, can do to learn about climate change and take action. Climate change is a critical and timely topic of deep concern, here told in an age-appropriate manner, with clarity and hope. Kids can make a difference!
Issues Covered: Climate Change
Girls Who Looked Under Rocks
by Jeannine Atkins
Ages: 12 and up
If there is a pre-teen or adolescent in your life, especially a girl, take a look at this empowering, inspiring chapter book. It portrays the youths and careers of six remarkable women whose curiosity about nature fueled a passion to steadfastly overcome obstacles to careers in traditionally men-only occupations. The six–Maria Merian (b.1647), Anna Comstock (b.1854), Frances Hamerstrom (b.1907), Rachel Carson (b.1907), Miriam Rothschild (b.1908), and Jane Goodall (b.1934)–all became renowned scientists, artists and writers. A wonderful resource for young researchers and biographers, these stories can be a starting point for issues of gender, science, and the environment.
Issues Covered: Nature, Women’s Rights
Phoebe Comes Home: 1st Volume of The Protectors of the Wood’ Adventure Novel Series
by John Kixmiller
Ages: 12 and up
Phoebe, George, Jeremy, Abby, Glenda, Stephanie and Eddie know a little more about their hometown than they wish they knew. The trouble is, they keep learning more, and the undeterrable Phoebe marches forward, determined that together this veritable “team of detectives” will uncover the mysteries and save their town from the dangers of climate change and corporatization. To do this they’ll have to keep dreamstone out of the hands of power hungry Milton Morphy. But Morphy has assembled his own crew of henchmen who will stop at nothing to get what they want. As the stakes rise, it looks like it will take an emergency to bring Middletown back together.
Issues Covered: Organic Gardening, Climate Change, Local vs. Global
Earth Heroes: Champions of Wildlife
by Carol L. Mainor and Bruce Mainor
Ages: 12 and up
This third and final volume of the Earth Heroes books features the youth and careers of eight of the world s greatest environmentalists who championed the protection of wildlife. It includes the historic and contemporary figures of William Hornaday (saved the bison from extinction), Ding Darling (A Duck s Best Friend), Rachel Carson (author of Silent Spring), Roger Tory Peterson (Inventor of the Modern Field Guide), R.D. Lawrence (Storyteller for Wolves), E.O. Wilson (Lord of the Ants), Jane Goodall (Champion for Chimps), and Ian and Saba Douglas-Hamilton (Saving the Elephants). This highly readable volume with illustrations and photographs calls attention to the waves of influence that spread from the ideas and actions of these heroes for the Earth.
Issues Covered: Wildlife, Endangered Species
Seedfolks
by Paul Fleischman
Ages: 13 and up
A Vietnamese girl plants six lima beans in a Cleveland vacant lot located in a diverse neighborhood of immigrants. A sense of community sprouts and spreads, and thirteen speakers share their stories and bring to life the founding and first year of the community garden.
Issues Covered: Food Justice, Immigration, Conservation
Stuff: The Secret Lives of Everyday Things
by John C. Ryan and Alan Thein Durning
Ages: 14 and up
Stuff follows a day in the life of a fictional, typical North American middle-class resident of Seattle. Nothing terribly unusual or dramatic happens. Unless you count average consumption–which Stuff does. Tracing back the layers of distribution, commerce, and production involved in everyday consumer goods Stuff is an engaging and fact-packed look at the people and places that are affected every time you sip your coffee, tie your shoes, click your mouse, step on the gas, or read a book.
Issues Covered: Overconsumption, Conservation, Resource Use
One Makes a Difference: Inspiring Actions that Can Change Our World
by Julia Butterfly Hill
Ages 14 and up
Julia Butterfly Hill has ceaslessly continued her efforts to promote sustainability and ecologically-minded ways to save the old-growth redwoods she acted so valiantly to protect. Here she provides her many young fans with what they yearn for most — her advice on how to promote change and improve the health of the planet, distilled into an essential handbook.
Issues Covered: Activism, Conservation
The Legacy of Luna
by Julia Butterfly Hill
Ages: 14 and up
On December 18, 1999, Julia Butterfly Hill’s feet touched the ground for the first time in over two years, as she descended from “Luna,” a thousandyear-old redwood in Humboldt County, California. Hill had climbed 180 feet up into the tree high on a mountain on December 10, 1997, for what she thought would be a two- to three-week-long “tree-sit.” The action was intended to stop Pacific Lumber, a division of the Maxxam Corporation, from the environmentally destructive process of clear-cutting the ancient redwood and the trees around it. The area immediately next to Luna had already been stripped and, because, as many believed, nothing was left to hold the soil to the mountain, a huge part of the hill had slid into the town of Stafford, wiping out many homes.
Issues Covered: Deforestation, Activism