"The World Almanac for Kids 2007" (World Almanac Books, $12.99)
The standard version of "The World Almanac and Book of Facts" is a thick book with no-nonsense blocks of text and columns of stats. The children's version is quite the opposite -- vivid, heavily illustrated, with snippets and chunks of information, lists, and attention-grabbing graphics.
The contents page serves as a guide to general topics, from animals to world history, with sections including books and buildings, holidays and homework help. An index helps fine-tune the research. And if all those facts start to overwhelm, breaks are offered in pages of jokes, riddles, quizzes and word-connect, word-search and sudoku puzzles.
"Time for Kids: Almanac 2007" edited by Curtis Slepian (Time for Kids Magazine/Time, Inc., $12.99)
This one also offers plenty of fun stuff, but quizzes and puzzles can be educational, too. For the fact-seeker, there are chapters on topiccs including newsmakers, buildings, geography, health, science, the United States and the world, along with an index. Information includes a comparison of the planets, thumbnail sketches of U.S. presidents, the alphabet in American Sign Language, and tips for taking tests (none of which includes writing answers on your palms).
A guide to using the Internet tells kids how to conduct research on the Web and how to use the Internet safely.
"The Perfect Pop-Up Punctuation Book" by Kate Petty and Jannie Maizels (Dutton Children's Books, $14.99)
This clever book entertains youngsters with its playful pop-ups while it gives lessons in basic English punctuation.
By lifting flaps and pulling tabs, kids learn how to start and end a sentence, how to use quotation marks and exclamation points, and what the difference is between a colon and a semicolon.
"Comma jokes" give examples of how a misplaced or omitted comma can change the meaning of a sentence, sometimes with amusing results. And there's a test on apostrophe usage with answers and explanations hidden under flaps.
The book is designed for ages 7 and older, but it can also serve as a refresher course for adults who become "comma-tose" when they try to remember their grammar-school grammar.
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