Ukraine

Blastoff! Readers: Exploring Countries

by Megan Borgert-Spaniol

Ukrainians have mastered the art of designing Easter eggs, called pysanky. People around the world try to replicate the fine details and colors of Ukrainian eggs. When not using food in artful ways, Ukrainians take pride in memorizing recipes and preparing meals from scratch. Young readers will learn more about life in Ukraine in this informative title.

Genres: Nonfiction

32 pages, Library Binding

First published January 1, 2014

Reviews

[Selkie Narwhal · Rating 3 out of 5]

Just Okay. Very basic and not enough info or pictures.

Sections/"2 page chapters" on daily life, school, working, playing, holidays, easter eggs, etc. Interesting to see Ukranian kids go to 1st school ages 6-10 to learn basic english and math; then ages 11-16 learn all the subjects like science, history, art, etc. So they are done by age 16. American homeschools and private schools finish schooling between ages 13-16 easily. So I think America's public education system is way too long and could learn from this. This book spends a whole section on holidays and another whole section just on easter egg painting. I would have preferred a book skip these or at least combine them, since this book basically has Easter covering on 4 pages.

Lacks a good map and landscape explanation. The map in this book is very poor - one big green blob with no details. Should have more details on the mountain ranges, water ranges and land use on a map.

[Andrea · Rating 3 out of 5]

Like most others I read this book because of my curiosity about Ukraine. I found this book really interesting, but I didn't realize it was a kid's series of travel books. That didn't really hinder my appreciation for it and it was well written, but I would have preferred something written for adults. Again, this has nothing to do with the actual book. In fact, it's a great resource for kids and as it turns out they have these for a lot of other countries. If I can ever find any others, I'm going to check them out as well.

[AMY · Rating 5 out of 5]

32 pages; Another great book in the Exploring Countries series. Format and information is excellent. Great photos, charts and additional information at the end. Great job! Highly recommended Gr. 4 and up.

[Ollie Skyba · Rating 4 out of 5]

This one is way better than a lot of touristic books about Ukraine I've ever seen in English. It isn't long, but bright and informative. The most important thing it includes a page about Crimean Peninsula.
The only thing I wish to correct - is page 29, where the capital of Ukraine mentioned as "Kiev", but has to be Kyiv, and other cities names written with old "pro-Soviet" forms.