You Wouldn't Want to Live Without Electricity!

by Ian Graham, Rory Walker (Illustrator)

We depend on electricity in almost everything that we do. It gives us heat, light, transportation and entertainment. Electricity has always existed, but it is only in the last 200 years or so that we have learned how to make use of it. Find out what electricity does for us – and how we managed without it in the past. You Wouldn’t Want to Live Without Electricity! is part of a brand-new science and technology strand within the internationally acclaimed You Wouldn’t Want to Be series. The clear, engaging text and humorous illustrations bring the subject to life and stimulate young readers' curiosity about the world around them. Specially commissioned cartoon-style illustrations in full colour make these books attractive and accessible even to reluctant readers. Information is conveyed through captions, labels and humorous speech bubbles in addition to the main text. Illustrated sidebars headed ‘How It Works’, ‘Top Tip’ or ‘You Can Do It’ supply more facts, describe simple, safe experiments, or steps that readers can take to help make the world a better place. Each volume includes a timeline and a list of ‘Did You Know?’ facts.

Genres: Nonfiction, Science, Childrens

40 pages, Kindle Edition

Published August 18, 2020

About the author

After working as an in-house journalist and editor in consumer electronics magazines, Ian Graham became a freelance writer. He has written more than 230 illustrated non-fiction books for children and teens, and contributed chapters to books including Dorling Kindersley’s Know it All and Big Ideas that Changed the World. He has a degree in applied physics and a postgraduate diploma in journalism.

Reviews

[Nick · Rating 4 out of 5]

A bit less focused than some of the books in this series, it nonetheless conveys a lot about the topic, and puts electricity into a context relative to other sources of power. My only problem with the book is that on a couple of occasions, it gives safety warnings which make no sense, like turning off the power to an electrical outlet before plugging things in or removing a plug. I'm not sure that the safety warning about lightning works, either...getting inside a car, but not touching anything metal? Have you ever tried to do that? You're within sparking distance of metal no matter where you are in almost any modern vehicle.
Still not sure why you can't do simple battery-and-light experiments with a rechargeable battery, either...

[Courtney Nipper · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is a fun way to learn about electricity. This book shows the history of electricity beginning with fire, to sparks, to motors and movement, to thunder and lightening, to storing energy, etc. It is written with humor and funny pictures. The book finishes off by talking about going green and ways to save electricity. This book is a science/environmental non-fiction. I would use this in middle school for a science lesson on electricity and a hook or closure to an experiment.

[Leslie Fisher · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is another great and informative book if this series. What I liked about this book is that it includes experiments that kids can do to help demonstrate the concepts outlined in the book. I read these to my Kindergarten-age son, and he is so fascinated by them and asks lots of questions, which sparks interesting discussions.

[Sue · Rating 5 out of 5]

Hurricane Harvey cut our electricity for 4 days, and I grew up without electricity and water, sometimes. I would be reverted back to caveman days--all I can do is flip a switch. Same as cars, TV or any other thing other people have invented.

[Gretchen · Rating 4 out of 5]

This series is wonderful. It is full of great facts, fun for students to read, and great non-fiction mentor texts for writers. This book would be a great one to read before I do the electricity unit in 4th grade. Then we could refer to it throughout since it talks about alternative energy sources and the future ideas of power. This book would also be great to be used a section at a time before or after experiments to set up or review the lessons learned.

[Kathryn Jaeger]

This book takes a look at how electricity works. It contains a an electricity timeline with tips and funny cartoon illustrations. It text explores how electricity works, to the ingenious ways that people have controlled and used it throughout the ages. The information helps the reader to explore the connection between historic scientific events and gives the reader access to the meanings of academic words and phrases. It brings to light how different the world would be without electricity.

[Lauren Jackson · Rating 4 out of 5]

Informational
4th to 6th

This was such a fun and interesting book to read. One thing I noticed at first was that there were a lot of words on one page. I feel as though this made the book harder to read or even pick up. However, after reading I can honestly say the book had many different facts in there that were really cool and would interest students in this grade level. I love how the book had the students actually had students thinking. The author did a great job providing questions that cause the readers to use their brains. Overall, this was a great informational book.

[Dolly · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is an interesting and informative book about electricity. We all learned quite a bit from reading it, and the short anecdotes really helped to spice up the narrative.

The information presented in this book is quite a bit more dense than what we've typically seen in other You Wouldn't Want to... books and it may be a bit too much for younger children.

I liked the description of the various experiments children can conduct. I appreciated the safety precautions, and I would strongly recommend parents supervise the experiments.

Even though we have a coal power plant located in close proximity to our home in West Virginia, I learned a more about how a coal plant operates.

Additionally, I learned that "nearly half of all electricity is made by burning coal." (p. 24) I thought our nation had transitioned more to nuclear and other renewable sources.

The last few pages concentrated on alternative sources for electricity and ways we can help conseve it.

Not much detail is provided for any of the topics, so it's more of an overview than anything. If a child's interest is piqued by a topic, I would recommend other books that focus more in depth on it.

We read this book independently and enjoyed the science/history lesson. We will certainly look for more of these books at our local library.

interesting quote:

"Our modern word 'electricity,' first used in the 17th century, comes from the ancient Greek word for amber - elektron." (p. 10)

new words: hypocaust, pyroelectricity