Mama Miti: Wangari Maathai and the Trees of Kenya

Mama Miti: Wangari Maathai and the Trees of Kenya by Donna Jo Napoli

My rating: 2 of 5 stars


This title was okay but only as a backup of additional info to last year's WAW title Planting the trees of Kenya : the story of Wangari MaathaiPlanting the Trees of Kenya: The Story of Wangari Maathai I thought Planting the Trees of Kenya was better information and had more depth to the story.

School Library Journal (February 1, 2010)
Gr 3-4-This idealistic account focuses on Wangari's wisdom in advising women to plant different kinds of trees to solve their particular economic problems. "Here are seedlings of the mukinduri. This tree makes good firewood." "Plant a tree. A mukawa. Its thorns will keep out predators." Napoli inserts a Kikuyu phrase and its translation after each bit of Wangari's advice. "Thayu nyumba"-"Peace, my people." The story seems to suggest that the trees were a rather quick solution to the people's problems of hunger and poverty in Kenya's devastated landscape. "Soon cool, clear waters teemed with black, wriggling tadpoles.. All over the countryside the trees that had disappeared came back." Nelson depicts the various women and the greening of the landscape in bold collages of textile prints joined with strong painted portraits. The poetic, abbreviated story has little biographical detail, emphasizing the planting of millions of trees and the resulting prosperity and peace for the country and its people. The preface describing the ill effects of earlier drought and the broad sweep of text provide less concrete information and explanation than Claire A. Nivola's Planting the Trees of Kenya (Farrar) and Jeanette Winter's Wangari's Trees of Peace (Harcourt, both 2008). The information is too vague for primary grade children, and probably too skimpy for older grades. Still, the book could serve as a beautiful introduction for children just learning about the Greenbelt Movement. Concluding materials include an afterword for adults, a source note, a Kikuyu glossary, a list of Web sites most useful for adults, and a brief note from the illustrator.-Margaret Bush, Simmons College, Boston Copyright 2010 Reed Business Information.