Book Title: A Giant Dose of Gross (available here)
Author: Andy Seed
Illustrator: Claire Almon
Publisher: QED Publishing
Publication Date: Oct 2019
Most Suitable For: KS2
Reviewed By: Louise Buisson, Primary English Leader
Did you know that sea cucumbers can eject their guts out of their rear ends to poison predators? Or, that chimpanzees search through their own poo for half-digested items to snack on? Neither did I until I read this book!
A Giant Dose of Gross is jammed full of disgusting yet riveting facts about the animal kingdom. The book is divided into sections including animals that do gross things, animals that live in other animals and animals that drink blood. Each section is split into manageable paragraphs about a variety of animals and includes a heading, introductory paragraph, sub-headings and a bullet-pointed box of extra information. This would be a great model text for showing non-chronological report writing at Key Stage Two. All of the pictures are illustrations: often with amusing speech bubbles. I presume that photographs may have been a little too graphic for this subject matter!
Along with animal information, the geographical locations of many of the animals are given which could be linked with map skills. At the end of the book there are two quizzes which, given the subject matter, could make practicing retrieval skills more tempting than usual for some children.
I lent this book out to a member of my class and found that it was such high demand that I had trouble getting it back to write this review!
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You can order A Giant Dose of Grose online or from your local bookshop or library.
Many thanks to the publisher for sending us a review copy of this book and to Review Panel member Louise for reviewing it.
Where next?
> Visit our Reading for Pleasure Hub
> Browse our Topic Booklists
> View our printable year group booklists.
> See our Books of the Month.
