We Are the Keystones, an oversized look at biomes and fauna that bind us

I was at a school for the first time this school year the other day. They were explaining to me the ‘new’ method that they were teaching students on how to write compelling paragraphs. For reference, this class was on-level and in eighth grade. For further reference, all of this is coming forward to a review of We Are the Keystones: Animals That Hold Habitats Together. This is an oversized illustrated book that uses inlay art on its cover, set against the silhouettes of some of the animals that young audiences will meet inside its pages. The cover evokes a Native American vibe due to the massive amount of Earthy tones that are set against a black background. At the same time, the cover encourages readers to trace the meandering rabbit path like Billy from The Family Circus. It’s also oversized, about 40% wider than other illustrated books this young age is accustomed to. The book commands your attention, and pays homage to the three tenants of selling and teaching that my school system just ‘discovered’.

We Are the Keystones opens with a young girl and her mother taking a walk in the woods. Audiences will see a beaver’s tail on the trail as its torso is scurrying into the brush. The two-page landscape has six lines of prose on it, with the rhyme happening on the final word, distinguished by every two lines. It’s just enough poetry to make young audiences curious, without putting off those who have already become averse to the genre.*

Young readers will intrinsically follow the beaver and turn the page. The bait on the hook has been taken. Now they’ll see a distant, yet, specific view of a beaver dam. The beaver dam is simply introduced as being one of “the keystones”. There’s still text in the bottom right of the pagWe Are the Keystones: Animals That Hold Habitats Together, We Are the Keystones, Katy S. Duffield,  Hannah Salyer, Beach Lane Books, Simon & Schuster Children’s Publishing, illustrated stem books, illustrated non-fiction books,e species is and why they’re so important. Turn the page again and young readers will get a close up of one of the beavers making a dam and some of the critters that thrive near it.  

The keystone species are animals, plant or other organisms that have a massive impact on the environment surrounding them. The dam provides untold benefits to the creatures that live near or in the river. The black-tailed prairie dog is actually a rodent whose underground burrows provide life and shelter to snakes, lizards or other small critters might share their space. Of course, that opens up the area to snakes, who also have a place to eat and sleep. The burrows provide ways or water and air to freely move that allows the flora to grow quicker up above. On this page readers will see one large prairie dog surveying the landscape, with buffalo above and a cross-section of things below ground.

Turn the page and young readers will see the snout of a grizzly bear who’s about to catch a salmon swimming upstream in a roaring river. The river is a keystone that produces rich soil for plants, birds and other things that live off of their remnants. The female South American green-backed firecrown is a hummingbird. They’re also a keystone species whose long beak allows it to pollenate select varieties of flowers that other birds aren’t able to. The Florida Everglades are a biome that experiences some dry seasons. During those seasons, gator holes allow  that scarce resource the option to pond up, providing an oasis of sorts for wayward amphibians, insects or birds.

As young readers immerse themselves into We Are the Keystones, its oversized pages will practically turn themselves. The six lines of rhyming prose helps calm readers down. Those full-page illustrations will take them from corner-to-corner as their fingers trace the flat surface. Sneaky  adult readers will explain the text as they read it, pointing out the parrotfish when they’re talking about the coral branches that 25% of the Earth’s marine life calls home. That’s a keystone and We Are the Keystones: Animals That Hold Habitats Together is a statement illustrated book that will stick with young audiences in pre-k through lower middle school.

Wha? Lower middle school, that must be a typo, but it’s not. At the end of this book two pages further explain how keystones got their name, examples of other keystone species, and a list of resources for more information. This is a book that feeds those fifth-grade non-fiction reports, as well as, those sixth-grade students who are researching the same thing but want a little sugar to help the medicine go down. To paraphrase what the first paragraph was trying to say, We Are the Keystones tells, explains and tells, all without audiences realizing they’re learning at all, which is the most effortless education of all.

We Are the Keystones: Animals That Hold Habitats Together is by Katy S. Duffield with illustrations by Hannah Salyer and is available on Beach Lane Books an imprint of Simon & Schuster Children’s Publishing.

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