The countdown clock is almost at zero—and suddenly, a player scores a three-pointer to win the game! Professional basketball is full of underdog stories. Sometimes, a lower-seeded team can dominate the top seed to win an NBA Championship. Learn about some of the biggest upsets in basketball history.
Babe Didrikson Zaharias not only broke records—she took athletics by storm, winning two Olympic gold medals for track and field before turning to professional golf. Witness more exciting moments from the life of this multi-talented athlete.
Melissa Vivianne Jeffersion, known professionally as Lizzo, started singing and rapping at age 10 and performed with several musical groups in her hometowns of Houston and Minneapolis. With her strong lyrics, danceable beats, and positive message, she's become one of the biggest solo musicians in the world.
Ariana Grande always wanted to be a star. After honing her voice in community theater, Grande landed her first big role in a Broadway musical. On the Nickelodeon show Victorious, her dream of singing before a national audience came true. Soon Grande's music career was ready to soar. Her albums sold millions of copies, and fans from around the world flocked to see her perform. When tragedy struck her concert in Manchester, England, Grande responded with care and support for her fans. Trace Grande's journey from local talent to global superstar and see how she rocks the stage, advocates for mental health, and speaks up for women everywhere.
What happens when a young elephant steps on a buried land mine? What happens when a sea turtle’s flipper is injured by a predator? Thanks to recent advances in technology, we have new ways to design and build prosthetic body parts that can help these animals thrive. Meet an Asian elephant named Mosha, a Kemp’s ridley sea turtle named Lola, a German Shepherd named Cassidy, a greylag goose named Vitória, and Pirate, a Berkshire-Tamworth pig. Each of these animals was struggling, but through a variety of techniques and technologies, humans created devices that enabled the animals to live and move more comfortably. Discover the stories of how veterinarians, doctors, and even students from around the world used 3D printing and other techniques to build bionic body parts for these amazing animals.
In the history of life on this planet, 99.9 percent of all species have gone extinct. But a few have survived almost unchanged. Author Rebecca E. Hirsch introduces readers to six living fossils, including the chambered nautilus, the horseshoe crab with its sticky blue blood, and venomous platypuses that sting, as well as a comprehensive explanation of evolution and extinction for readers who may not be familiar with the terms yet. Readers will also discover a a spectacular timeline of the history of animal life on Earth. Dive into the stories of these incredible animals and find out how they help scientists piece together evolutionary history.
Charles Darwin's scientific work transformed the way people think about life on Earth. From his childhood in England to his pivotal ocean voyages, he took every opportunity to study the natural world. And he helped shape a new understanding of how life forms change over time. This graphic biography highlights Darwin's youthful push to become a naturalist—against the wishes of his stern father. It also shares a look at his field research, collaborations, and scientific breakthroughs.
Burmese pythons are native to Southeast Asia, so when one showed up dead along the side of a Florida highway in 1979, scientists wondered where it came from. No one knew the snakes had launched a full-scale invasion. Pet pythons that escaped or were released by their owners started breeding in the wild, and these enormous predators began eating every animal in their path. Today a group of scientists at the Conservancy of Southwest Florida is tracking Burmese pythons to find ways to stop their spread. Page Plus links lead to video clips and photos of the scientists working in the field. Delve into the science of pythons and their role as invasive predators.
At the start of the twentieth century, Marie Curie, a Polish physicist and chemist, stunned the scientific world. Her research led to the discovery of two elements, polonium and radium. She also examined the most unusual property of these elements: radioactivity. This graphic biography follows Curie from her early life in Poland to her scientific education in France. It also spotlights her work with Pierre Curie and her efforts to treat wounded soldiers during World War I.
Isaac Newton's youth was marked by constant curiosity. As he began a life of research and experiments, he turned this curiosity into major insights about the workings of Earth and the universe. He even developed three laws to explain the motions of objects. This graphic biography moves from Newton's childhood inventions to the breakthrough theories of his adult life. It also spotlights his time at England's Royal Mint, where he combated counterfeiting, and his gift of knighthood from Queen Anne.
Albert Einstein's restless intelligence drove him to ponder the biggest topics the universe has to offer: light, time, mass, energy, and more. His conclusions changed the way people thought about the laws of physics. But first, he had to pass his university entrance exams. This graphic biography traces Einstein's path from his home country of Germany to his studies in Switzerland to his time in the United States. It also follows his life as an international scientific celebrity and his refusal to stay silent in the face of anti-Semitism.
The fossil fuels powering cars, trains, and planes are harming the environment, but scientists are creating innovative and clean transportation solutions. Explore the future of transportation from self-flying drones to levitating trains.
Beginning coders can build their skill set with step-by-step instructions and animation projects. Start with stop-motion, add text and emoji, and finish with a few special effects! Page Plus links to hands-on coding activities are included. These project-based titles are created in partnership with Vidcode, an online coding platform for grades 4 and up.
As Earth's human population grows, scientists and farmers must find new ways to create more food with less space. Learn about the challenges farmers face, how the meat industry may change, and more about the future of food.
How can we make the world a better place? This inspiring resource for middle-grade readers is organized as a dictionary - each entry presents a word related to creating a better world, such as ally, empathy, or respect. For each word, there is a poem, a quote from an inspiring person, a personal anecdote from the authors, and a "try it" prompt for an activity.
American politician Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez is the youngest woman ever to serve in the US Congress. Learn about her young life, her work as an activist, and her career in the House of Representatives.
Create a filter, dress up a photo, share it with your friends! Beginning coders learn solid skills while they build their own filters. Page Plus links to hands-on coding activities are included. These project-based titles are created in partnership with Vidcode, a rigorous and creative online coding platform designed for grades 4 and up that appeals as strongly to girls as to boys.
During the Middle Ages, your position in life was based on birth. This position would follow you throughout your life. To make it easy for others to know your social class, rules about what you could wear—or not wear—were created. Such rules, called sumptuary laws, determined colors of clothing, types of fabric and trims, length of garments, types of sleeves, and types of furs. The laws also regulated shoe lengths and height, hat height, types of buttons, and even the number of buttons you could wear. People were to dress according to the class in which they were born. In this way, just by looking at someone, you could tell if they were important or not.
A suspenseful and heartfelt story about an era whose uncertainties, controversies, and dangers will seem anything but distant to contemporary readers. If thirteen-year-old Marty Rafner had his way, he'd spend the summer of 1953 warming the bench for his baseball team, listening to Yankees games on the radio, and avoiding preparations for his bar mitzvah. Instead, he has to deal with FBI agents staking out his house because his parents—professors at the local college—are suspected communist sympathizers. Marty knows what happens to communists, or Reds, as his friends call them: They lose their jobs, get deported...or worse. Two people he's actually met, Julius and Ethel Rosenberg, have been convicted of being communist spies, and they're slated to be executed in two months. Marty just wants everything to go back to normal, but that's impossible thanks to the rumors that his parents are traitors. As his friends and teammates turn on him and federal agents track his every move, Marty isn't sure what to believe. Is his family really part of a Red Menace working against the United States? And even if they're simply patriotic Americans who refuse to be bullied by the government, what will it cost them?
Scott Schroeder dreams of a day when he and his father can have a home of their own. Following an accident that took his mother's life eight years before, doctors discovered Scott was suddenly deaf. Blessed with being an accomplished gymnast and skilled at signing and reading lips, Scott's biggest challenge is convincing others he is able to do all the same things as those in the hearing world. Picking up on conversations he observes along the way, Scott figures out a big family secret concerning his father and uncle and makes his mind up to play a part in their reconciliation.
Growing up on Chicago's South Side, Michelle LaVaughn Robinson loved school and her family. Driven by her parents' passion for education and her own desire to succeed, she graduated first from Princeton and then Harvard Law School and landed a job at a prestigious law firm, where she met her soon-to-be husband, Barack Obama. While raising their two young daughters, Michelle Obama committed herself to public service. She kept that commitment as her husband's political career soared and worked hard to continue serving the public when her family landed in the White House. Follow Obama's journey from Chicago school kid to history-making First Lady and beyond as she continues to make her mark as an inspiring speaker, bestselling author, and agent for positive change.
On December 18, 2019, Donald Trump became the third president in US history to be impeached by the House of Representatives. He was later acquitted by the Senate. Earlier that summer, Trump held a phone call with President Volodymyr Zelensky of Ukraine. An unknown whistleblower raised concerns about the call, claiming that Trump had improperly pressured Zelensky to get involved in US politics. Over the following months a dramatic impeachment inquiry unfolded. Fraught hearings played out on television while Democrats and Republicans traded interpretations, arguments, and even insults. Faced with suppressed information and conflicting accounts, the nation tried to discover the truth. In over two hundred years Congress has gathered only a handful of times to debate what makes an impeachable offense. What events led to Trump’s impeachment? How does the impeachment process work? What other presidents have been impeached, and why? Learn the history, mechanics, and milestone events behind impeachment, and discover how the most recent one may affect US politics for years to come.
Follow the spectacular shots, thrilling comebacks, and monumental moments of basketball's most exciting games. Readers learn about the history and greatest players of the NBA (National Basketball Association) and WNBA (Women's National Basketball Association) Finals.
Fuel up for an exciting look at Formula 1 racing! Readers will learn about the history of the sport, some of the most well-known racers, and more with the aid of exciting photos and thrilling facts!
Enter the thrilling world of stock car racing! Readers will discover the history of stock car racing, what a typical race day looks like, who the hottest racers are, and more.
