Ready for the Olympics

It’s Wednesday and that means the Nonfiction Picture Book Challenge hosted by Kid Lit Frenzy. We are pretty darn excited about the Olympics in this house so I thought it would be the perfect opportunity to highlight a visually stunning book about sports and the Olympics.

This is the first time that both of my girls actually want to watch the opening ceremonies as well as many of the events. My husband is a big sports fan and sports and news are really the only reason we still have cable. I, on the other hand, almost never watch sports, but even I get the Olympic bug. So when I was offered a copy of Everything Sports from National Geographic Kids, I jumped at the chance.

Everything Sports is aimed at readers aged 8-12.  From archery to zip lining this book covers EVERYTHING about the world’s most popular, most obscure and most grueling team and individual sports. Dozens of athletics pursuits are profiled and the book covers sports history, rules and regulations, and training, and a Hall of Fame that profiles the giants in downhill skiing, hockey, gymnastics, football and more.  There is even a quiz kids can take to see if they’d make a good ref.  Packed with big, bold pictures and graphics and featuring a diverse array of athletes (men and women of all races, young and old,) Everything Sports not only includes the most popular sports such as baseball, basketball, football, soccer, tennis, but also features the more extreme and quirkier sports like parkour, wakeboarding, fencing, curling, and table tennis.

This book has a ton of facts put together into bite-size pieces that make it a great book to pick up and play around with. Like all National Geographic books, the photographs are mind-blowing. Some of the more interesting spreads, to me, were items about What is a Sport, Who Plays What, some of the amazing photo galleries, and the X-games, although I still don’t fully understand what Parkour is.

The pieces on the Olympics themselves are informative and quite useful. So are the comparisons between professional and amateur play. As someone who appreciates sports but hasn’t done a great job of getting my girls fully informed about them, the spreads about the history and rules of individual sports are great references.

I remember when the Winter Olympics were happening that it was a struggle to find good Olympic themed books for kids. I recently reviewed Nadia and Valarie Budayr of Jump Into a Book put together a link-up of posts about the Olympics. Everything Sports is definitely a great addition to the list.

While you’re having fun with the Olympics theme, National Geographic Kids also put together a really great Funny Fill-In with an Olympics focus – My Gold Medal Adventure. In this fun activity book, create silly stories a-la mad libs with an Olympics theme. You can create a story on your own by filling in the necessary words on the left hand page or complete it with a friend by filling in the words directly on the story on the right hand page. We love doing these in the car and while waiting for appointments. A great way to work on grammar, have fun, and celebrate the Olympics!