The Magic School Bus Inside The Human Body (Magic School Bus)

From Publishers Weekly
Ms. Frizzle shepherds her reluctant students through the human body in a book that is as fancifully conceived as it is educational. Ages 6-9. Copyright 1990 Reed Business Information, Inc.


From School Library Journal
Grade 1-4-- Time to board the Magic School Bus again with that wild, wacky, and wonderful teacher, Ms. Frizzle. After she teaches her class about the human body and they visit the science museum, Mrs. Frizzle shrinks the bus and the class--except Arnold, who swallows them. This gives Cole and Degen the chance for two parallel stories, inside and outside of Arnold. With the bus inside, Cole explains digestion from the stomach into the small intestines. Then the bus enters a blood vessel where readers can see the plasma, red and white blood cells, and the flow into the heart. From there the class, now out of the bus and garbed in operating room smocks and masks, flows with the blood cells, now with fresh oxygen, to the brain. They climb down the bones of the spine, follow nerves to see muscles work, and then finally catch up with the bus to emerge in the nasal cavity. Meanwhile on part of each facing page, Arnold has coped with being lost and alone and has made it back to the school. With an enormous sneeze he sends the bus out to join him in the parking lot. The class can now chart the body from actual experience. Cole concludes with a true-false test with answers to help readers distinguish reality from fantasy. As readers of the previous "Magic School Bus" books (Scholastic) know, this is an enjoyable look at factual material painlessly packaged with the ribbons and balloons of jokes and asides meant to appeal to kids. Degen's zany, busy, full-color drawings fill the pages with action and information far beyond the text. Using a variety of visuals, including notes, close-ups, and diagrams along with a variety of realistic kids, he moves the parallel stories to their conclusions. Kids will love this book. --Sylvia S. Marantz, Wellington School, Columbus, OhioCopyright 1989 Reed Business Information, Inc.


Book Description
Talk about a change of plans! Ms. Frizzle and her class are on the Magic School Bus headed for a museum. They have been studying how the body turns food into energy, and now they are going to see an exhibit on the human body. Things seem fine until they stop for lunch. A strange mishap causes the bus to shrink and then be swallowed! Ms. Frizzle's class is suddenly inside a real human body!


Card catalog description
A special field trip on the magic school bus allows Ms. Frizzle's class to get a first-hand look at major parts of the body and how they work.


Buy from Amazon     Compare Prices

Gr 4-6A flashy, colorful set of books with numerous die-cut pages, transparencies, fold-outs, and reusable stickers. All of the titles feature short text, lots of full-color illustrations, informative captions, and sidebars. The spiral bindings are enclosed in a standard spine, making the books easy to label and attractive to shelve. Architecture begins with simple shelters, progresses to the classical world's constructions, medieval castles and cathedrals, Japanese paper houses, bridges, London's Crystal Palace, skyscrapers, and Frank Lloyd Wright's Fallingwater. Moviemaking covers the development of motion pictures from stills, the invention of talkies and technicolor, Hollywood, competition from television, special effects and animation, and notable people, such as Chaplin and Eisenstein. Flight starts with the dream of flight and flying animals and continues with kites, gliders, balloons and dirigibles, the invention of airplanes, the Wright Brothers, early flying aces, warplanes, and how navigational systems work. Wind discusses the atmosphere, clouds, different kinds of precipitation, rainbows and mirages, weather systems and storms, climates, and forecasting the weather. None of the books goes into great depth, but all have small, useful tidbits of information scattered throughout. Occasionally, simplification of the topics results in some strange wording: e.g., drag is explained by saying that "air tries to pull the plane backward," and light is compared to "millions of tiny balls," which may be misleading to beginners. Nonetheless, due to their format, style, and appealing topics, these books are sure to be popular.Jeffrey A. French, Cleveland Heights-University Heights Public Library


Buy from Barnes & Noble     Compare Prices