If … : A Mind-Bending New Way of Looking at Big Ideas and Numbers by David J. Smith (review)

Smith, who has produced such popular curricular staples as If the World Were a Village (BCCB 2/02), turns his attention to scale—more precisely, to scaling down, via analogies, from a very large number to more manageable concept. If 3.5 billion years of life on Earth is too much time to comprehend, scaling the time down to twenty-four hours allows the author to convey just how late in the day recognizable creatures showed up (fish at 51 minutes, 10 seconds; earliest human ancestors at 59 minutes, 56 seconds). A hundred light bulbs demonstrate world energy consumption, with two bulbs representing hydroelectric power, and a whopping eighty-one representing fossil fuels. Not all analogies—expressed not only in text but also by Adams’ playful, ever-so-slightly surreal paintings—are equally clear, though. It will take many young readers some puzzling out, for instance, to connect North Americans’ leading the pack in life expectancy with 78 footsteps in the sand, while the sidebar information is expressed in terms of countries, with the United States notably missing. A concluding note to parents and teachers promotes the use of scaling activities, but, frustratingly, formulas for conversion appear in neither note nor text. A selected list of resources is included.