Chil­dren’s

Albert Ein­stein: Great Scientist

Anne Marie Sullivan
  • Review
By – October 31, 2014

The book opens with a quote by Albert Ein­stein about being Ger­man, Swiss, a cit­i­zen of the world, and a Jew. The accompa­nying illus­tra­tion has him imag­in­ing him­self in each role as he works on sci­en­tif­ic for­mu­las. As a child, Albert Ein­stein was qui­et and awk­ward. Being a Jew in Ger­many at the turn of the last cen­tu­ry exac­er­bat­ed his awk­ward per­son­al­i­ty and school prob­lems. He had trou­ble mak­ing friends and prob­lems with learn­ing in the class­room. As Albert grew up, his uncle Jacob and tutor Max Tal­mud taught him to use his mind in ways he didn’t learn in school, lead­ing him to become an expert in math and sci­ence. Einstein’s ideas helped change the way sci­en­tists thought of the world around us and helped change the course of his­to­ry in the atom­ic age. Sul­li­van men­tions Einstein’s tremen­dous accom­plish­ments and sci­en­tif­ic the­o­ries along­side his disappoint­ment in hav­ing con­tributed to the mak­ing of the atom­ic bomb. He chose not to become the pres­i­dent of Israel in favor of spend­ing the end of his life pro­mot­ing peace. The infor­ma­tion is well researched and pre­sent­ed. The illustra­tions are engag­ing car­i­ca­tures of Ein­stein, his par­ents, New­ton, and oth­ers. Each page is accom­pa­nied by one or more illus­tra­tions, mak­ing this his­tor­i­cal book with heavy scien­tific con­cepts an invit­ing read. 

Rec­om­mend­ed for ages 9 – 15.

Dro­ra Arussy, Ed.D., is an edu­ca­tion­al con­sul­tant who spe­cial­izes in inte­grat­ing Jew­ish and sec­u­lar stud­ies, the arts into edu­ca­tion, and cre­ative teach­ing for excel­lence in Jew­ish edu­ca­tion. She is the moth­er to four school-age chil­dren and has taught from pre-school through adult. Dro­ra is an adjunct pro­fes­sor of Hebrew lan­guage at Drew University.

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