
Member Reviews

Kids will love the inventive Wanda who is always wondering if there's an easier way. Adults will love the inventions or 'life hacks' she comes up with!
This book will inspire kids to think for themselves and try things out.

Few things- great if your looking for a mixed race family book!
theres go problem solving skills
A child using scientific method to figure out what she should do when she grows ups.
Pictures are cute

Although I could see the potential in this text, I was not able to sustain my attention and finish the narrative.

I love, love, love this book. As the title shows this book is geared toward little girls, but anyone would enjoy this book. But I do think it is important for young girls to see that they can solve problems on their own and find solutions. Wanda is faced with several issues and she sees what the problem is and then works to make things better. Who can't learn from that? At the end of the book it explains what the scientific method is and explains it in a way that is easily understood. This would be the perfect book to read in science class at the beginning of the school year. Children sometimes need to see practical applications from their lives to understand scientific method.

I received an ARC from NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.
This was a cute story about a little girl that wants to try different jobs when she grows up. There are things about each job that she doesn't like, so she decides to invent ways to solve those problems. The pictures were bright and the text was simple.I like that the family was biracial.

This is a GREAT book. I read this to my daughter, and she loved it. The book contained great artwork, and it was a great story. It is also a great help with scientific experimentation, and learning about the process. :)

A girl inventor and problem solver in a mixed race family? Fantastic! My three year old daughter really enjoyed this and all the situationsshown were really relatable for her.

Young Wanda is what you might call a problem-solver. And the world needs more of those.
I still need to try out her method of separating egg whites and yolks to see if it's all it's "cracked up to be" (pun intended). I actually Googled it and it does appear as an egg separating hack all over the internet.
I read a digital copy of #WandasBetterWay from the publisher via #NetGalley.

Wanda's Better Way is a story of a little girl finding herself-- for now.. Wanda drifts from activity to activity and the adults in her life notice she is bored. But in each activity, Wanda finds and solves a problem, through her own invention, using the scientific process. The book is beautifully illustrated and notable for Wanda being part of a biracial family. The illustrations are necessary to the story, which is sparsely told, using activities others in Wanda's family enjoy but which are not quite right for Wanda. An afterward includes an excellent introduction to the scientific process for children including the fact that success is not always the outcome and we must try again.

Wanda’s Better Way by Laura Pedersen is a story about a young girl named Wanda. When she sees a problem, rather than getting frustrated, she problem solves and comes up with an invention that will solve the situation. She uses her knowledge from school or books (pulley systems) to design her inventions. Her final innovation becomes her Science Project that is a big hit. Everytime she comes upon a perceived problem, the illustrations show the scientific method she uses via thought bubbles. Not only is the problem solving method shown, but this book also shows a bit about decisions of what you might want to do in the future as well as determining what your interests really are. The illustrations are large, colourful and add to the story. There is not a lot going on so the reader can pay attention to what is being shown as the process. There are pages at the back of the book explaining the scientific method, which starts with observation and goes through several steps to a conclusion, which may include trying again. They are simply expressed and easy to follow. This would be a great book to use when introducing the Scientific Process to students as well as when Science Fair might be coming up. Hopefully this book will get young readers to try solving problems they come across in their lives. A good book to add to any library.

There are many books about kids thinking about what they want to do for a living when they grow up, but I love how this one is different. For one thing, the girl in this story starts out thinking she wants to be one thing, and realizes that what she really wants to do is fix whatever profession she thinks she has an interest in. For example, she thinks she might want to be a pastry chef, like her dad. But when she sees how long it takes him to separate eggs, she comes up with a better way to do so.
So, in the end, she decides she wants to be a scientist. The the book goes on to explain the scientific method of solving problems, just the way that Wanda did.
Also cool, Wanda is from a mixed race family. And also cool that this isn’t important to the story. :)
Thanks to Netgalley for making this book available for an honest review.