Wild Child: A Journey Through Nature
Shortlisted for The Wainwright Prize for Nature and Conservation Writing for Children
Shortlisted for the Edward Stanford Children’s Travel Book of the Year
Join the brilliant Dara McAnulty, winner of the Wainwright Prize for Diary of a Young Naturalist, as he takes you on a nature walk that starts just beyond your own front door, and shares the joy of connecting with the natural world on a multi sensory journey.
Wild Child: A Journey Through Nature is a beautiful book, illustrated in full colour by Barry Falls, and divided into five sections: looking out of the window, venturing out into the garden, walking in the woods, investigating heathland and wandering on the river bank.
Dara pauses to tell you about each habitat and provides fantastic facts about the native birds, animals and plants you will find there – including wrens, blackbirds, butterflies, tadpoles, bluebells, bees, hen harriers, otters, dandelions, oak trees and many more.
Each section contains a discovery section where you will have a closer look at natural phenomenon such as metamorphoses and migration, learn about categorization in the animal kingdom or become an expert on the collective nouns for birds.
Every chapter finishes with an activity to do when you get home: plant wild flowers, make a bird feeder, try pond dipping, make a journey stick and build a terrarium.
Dara closes the book with his own inspirational advice for young conservationists, making this the perfect guide for an aspiring naturalist.
Latest reviews
The writing was very small which is why it lost a star, but my mummy read it with me and it was a beautiful book. We liked it.
Short but lovely. I enjoyed how the beautiful description was mixed with fact and also activities. The reminder to be gentle, to be a friend of nature and a guardian was at the centre. Also to be present, to watch, to listen, to smell., to feel. A beautiful book. I read it twice through, one after another! What an amazing book to share with children and to give them the experience of actually walking in nature and connecting with country.
It was a fun book to read, and did some activities too Learnt a lot from the book, It was very knowledgable
It was the best book I have ever read
I liked the idea of going through the window to nature through the seasons. I loved the mix of poetry and facts. Some great science vocabulary too and the parts about classification and building terrariums were both just ace. The illustrations are beautiful too! A must for anyone teaching ks2 Science! Highly recommended! 🤩
This is the most beautiful book I have had the pleasure of browsing in a very long time. The art work and overall presentation of the vast amounts of information contained in this book is so pleasing. It is a book to dip into at different times or to sit and read through from cover to cover - whatever mood takes you. This is a gorgeous publication and should attract children and adults alike. I would not hesitate to recommend this as a welcome addition to all classrooms and homes.
I like it it hade lots of things to do in it. :)
A mixture of evocative prose poetry, interesting facts, accessible activities and beautiful illustrations, I loved this book and wished I could travel back in time and be a wild child myself. It brought back long ago memories of wading up brooks surrounded by the scent of wild garlic and the magic of the local bluebell wood. This would be a brilliant book to spark conversations about nature and conservation and to explore how the beauty of language can reflect the beauty of nature - looking too at the different functions of language (observation, classification, etc.) and how these can be used to help you think like/write like a naturalist. That the author is so young, makes the book even more attractive to children.
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