Most children love to scour pictures searching for objects Where’s Waldo—style. The Great Animal Search, part of a thoughtfully produced Look Puzzle Learn series, allows them to engage in this favorite activity and learn a whole lot about nature at the same time. In fact, this fascinating book requires that children go beyond rote search and find–children hunt for animals in a variety of realistic poses in their natural habitats, adding depth and richness to the educational experience. The scenes are so gorgeous that even children who possess only a mild interest in wildlife will be in awe.

Each two-page spread features a densely inhabited locale–from the Amazon rain forest and dusty Sonoran Desert to a North American conifer forest and a farm in Britain. Children refer to the borders of these spreads that are filled with pictures of animals and simple text captions to find out what–and how many–animals to look for in the featured vivid scene. The pictures in the key are not exactly as in the main scene–for example, the flying squirrel is depicted in a nonflying state on the border and "in action" in the jungle. This way, kids have to understand and get to know the animals better in order to identify them in a natural setting.

Some of the animals are easy to spot, like the line of four African elephants, or the two narwhals with their distinctive "horns," while others are found in more challenging hiding places. Sometimes animals are hard to find because children don’t know the relative size of the creature in context. For example, wrasses are shown on the border as the same size as barracudas. Kids may not know that they are actually looking for comparatively small creatures, though they’ll get a clue if they read the accompanying text (the wrasses "go into other fishes’ mouths and clean their teeth"). On the North Pole spread, children need to find four arctic hares, and only the ears of one of them can be seen. As well, some of the same animals can be differently sized, depending on whether they are in the forefront or background of the picture.

The text is simple and straightforward–easily read and digested by early-elementary-age children–providing quick facts about the animals depicted. Sometimes the text gives context clues, as in the Great Barrier Reef spread, where children need to find three of each pictured type of sea slug. Kids read that the slugs "slither across the coral," lending them a clue as to where they might find them! The themes vary a little as well, with children searching for, and learning the names of, animal babies on the farm, paying attention to animals that are active at night, and more.

There are detailed answer keys in the back of the book for easy self-correction. A map of the world neatly places the individual locales in geographical perspective, and an index helps kids find specific animals quickly.

Children learn diverse animal facts including their characteristics and habitats, identify animal babies and homes, and receive simple geography lessons as well. Because there are so many animals to spot, and the text is age-appropriately simple, the book serves as a broad introduction to the world of animals, not an in-depth study.

An important feature that sets this series apart from other search-and-find books is that children need to pay attention to the specific distinguishing characteristics of the creatures that inhabit our world, not just make-believe characters and objects. Because the animals in the featured scene are depicted in action, they are harder to spot, adding more depth to the educational value of the exercises. Children need to get acquainted with the animals on a visual level, so the experience goes above and beyond the mere studying of an animal guidebook.

Children as young as 4 and as old as 10 will take interest in this oversized book, though it’s probably ideal for those in kindergarten through the second grade. During the test period, if our 7-year-old tester wasn’t actively engaged searching and reading through the book’s pages, she had the book affectionately tucked under her arm many of her waking hours!

Other titles in the Great Search series include The Great History Search, The Great World Tour, The Great Dinosaur Search, and more.