Product Description

Kids love animals, and teaching them compassion early on helps them to become compassionate adults. This new edition of PETA President Ingrid E. Newkirk's book Kids Can Save the Animals is full of fascinating facts and more than 100 fun and easy projects and ideas that show children how they can get active for animals.

Children are encouraged to make compassionate choices in an upbeat, kid-friendly style, and the book is filled with fun illustrations, jokes, and puzzles. Whether purchasing for your own child or a friend's, you couldn't make a better choice in offering a book that will truly make a difference in the lives of many. 278 pages, paperback. Ages: 8 to 13.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #491113 in Books
• Published on: 2006-11-01
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Paperback
• 304 pages

Customer Reviews

Good but could be better
The concept of the book is great as are most of the suggestions. However, my family does not have any pets (as per the parental unit) and my sister and brother were looking for some more practical ways we could help animals. I wish I had known that so many tips involved things you do with your own pet. Not only that, but we don't have neighbors with pets, so it would have been nice to see tips for people in those situations. I feel like the book is written more for the typical suburban family than an inner city family such as mine. I gave the book three stars because I liked the tips, they just were not very practial for me.

Great for kids and their parents
In addition to giving animal advocacy a scientific boost in the nineteenth century, Charles Darwin promoted the notion that compassion for all creatures could be taught - instilled in children with the hope that ensuing generations would come to regard kindness toward animals as part of public consciousness. He may not have called it "humane education," but that's certainly what he had in mind. Likewise, this is the theme of Ingrid Newkirk's "50 Awesome Ways Kids Can Help Animals: Fun and Easy Ways to Be a Kind Kid." Originally published in 1991 as "Kids Can Save the Animals!: 101 Easy Things to Do," this renamed edition has been expanded and updated, but its message hasn't changed: we're never too young to learn respect for all life.

No, it doesn't seem Newkirk has cut her suggestions in half; indeed, there are probably hundreds of ideas here to benefit animals, the planet and human health. That's right: it's a vegan guidebook for the younger set. Organized into 50 very short chapters and written in a fun style sure to appeal to its target audience, the book goes beyond teaching kids how to merely be kind to animals, aiming for the higher goal of educating readers in virtually every aspect of vegan living, from cruelty-free diet and dress to speciesist language and animal activism - certainly no surprise coming from the president and co-founder of PETA. It's also chock-o-block with animal facts, jokes, vegan recipes, resources and quotes from celebrities kids will know.

What is likely to engage young readers as much as the lighthearted tone that never talks down to them is how the author incorporates a child's interest in animals with their love of games, toys, riddles and trivia, encouraging imagination and creativity. One chapter, for example, focuses on the virtually universal appeal stickers have for children, suggesting that kids append stickers with animal-rights messages onto letters, bikes, notebooks, skateboards and more. The many topics covered in "50 Awesome Ways Kids Can Help Animals" will also likely inspire countless persuasive essays, school projects and class speeches, thus disseminating its message to an even broader audience.

My only quibbles with the book concern domestic rabbits. These animals are very popular with kids, and Newkirk could have taken the opportunity to advise children and their parents to learn more about the misunderstood rabbit before bringing one home from a shelter or having one in class. Also, I was disappointed that she didn't make more of a case for keeping these animals indoors; though she notes that rabbits love to be inside, she describes an ideal backyard hutch, rather than explaining how to keep a bunny in the house, safe and as part of the family.

If we are to have any hope of a world in which animals are treated with compassion and respect, handing down a legacy of kindness is both our best course of action and an ethical obligation. Moreover, in an age when violent perpetrators seem to be getting younger, and such violence is presaged by childhood abuse of animals, raising empathetic children has become more than a parental hope, it's now a societal necessity. "50 Awesome Ways Kids Can Help Animals" is a step in the right direction, teaching a generation of kids what being humane is all about. I think Darwin would be proud.

Mark Hawthorne, author of Striking at the Roots: A Practical Guide to Animal Activism

Great Book for kids
I loved this book. I bought it with my 7 year old daughter in mind. She's been trying to go veg for a while and this was written in a format that she can understand.