Elinor Wonders Why, How to Carry a Cupcake

The three friends, Olive, Elinor, and Ari, are on a mission to take a cupcake to their teacher without squishing it. They test several methods before settling on one that works. Through their observations, they see how animals and plants in nature can protect their soft inner selves. Turtles have really hard shells made of bone and keratin. An armadillo shell is made up of bony plates, and coconut shells are made up of three parts: a shiny outside, a rough stringy middle, and a hard inside with the seed. Snail shells are soft and see-through when the snails are babies and get harder as the snail grows.

The friends finally decide that placing the cupcake inside a scooped-out coconut shell will protect the cupcake. It worked, and Ms. Mole got her present, intact.

The book’s end matter has a section titled “How Strong Are Eggshells?” with a list of resources needed for performing the experiment described under the section” Let’s Experiment” and the section entitled “We Need More Observations”. Both these sections state that students need an assistant (a grown-up) to help.

The full page, full colour illustrations use cartoons in a graphic novel format. The dialogue among the characters carries the story line with information boxes throughout that offer scientific facts.

Teachers and caregivers can use Elinor Wonders Why, How to Carry a Cupcake to introduce young children to the scientific method and how to perform simple experiments.