Whales

by Seymour Simon

Whales are among the biggest creatures that have ever lived on our planet. Some whales grow bigger than one hundred feet long and can weigh as much as fifty cars or more. They are huge, majestic creatures, yet we rarely ever lay eyes on them. Acclaimed science writer Seymour Simon introduces you to one of the world's truly amazing animals.  This nonfiction picture book is an excellent choice to share during homeschooling, in particular for children ages 6 to 8. It’s a fun way to learn to read and as a supplement for activity books for children. Seymour Simon knows how to explain science to kids and make it fun. He was a teacher for more than twenty years, has written more than 250 books, and has won multiple awards. This book includes an author's note, glossary, and index and supports the Common Core Learning Standards, Next Generation Science Standards, and the Science, Technology, Engineering, and Math (STEM) standards.

Genres: Science, Nonfiction, Picture Books, Animals, Childrens

40 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 1989

About the author

Seymour Simon, whom the NY Times called "the dean of [children's science:] writers," is the author of more than 250 highly acclaimed science books (many of which have been named Outstanding Science Trade Books for Children by the National Science Teachers Association).

Seymour Simon uses his website, SeymourSimon.com, to provide free downloads of a wealth of materials for educators, homeschoolers and parents to use with his books, including 4-page Teacher Guides for all 26 of his Collins/Smithsonian photo essay books. The site provides multiple resources for kids writing book reports or wanting to explore the online Science Dictionary, and also features the Seymour Science blog highlighting current science news. Educators and families are encouraged to sign up to receive the monthly newsletter from SeymourSimon.com to stay abreast of the latest materials that Seymour Simon is introducing to enrich the reading experience.

He taught science and creative writing in elementary and secondary schools and was chair of the science department at a junior high school in the New York City public school system before leaving to become a full-time writer. "I haven't really given up teaching," he says, "and I suppose I never will, not as long as I keep writing and talking to kids around the country and the world."

Seymour Simon is also a creator and the author of a series of 3D books and a series of Glow-in-the-Dark Books for Scholastic Book Clubs, a series of leveled SEEMORE READERS for Chronicle Books, and the EINSTEIN ANDERSON, SCIENCE DETECTIVE series of fiction books. His books encourage children to enjoy the world around them through learning and discovery, and by making science fun. He has introduced tens of millions of children to a staggering array of subjects; one prominent science education specialist described Simon's books as "extraordinary examples of expository prose."

Seymour Simon has been honored with many awards for his work, including the American Association for the Advancement of Science/Subaru Lifetime Achievement Award for his lasting contribution to children's science literature; the New York State Knickerbocker Award for Juvenile Literature; the Hope S. Dean Memorial Award from the Boston Public Library for his contribution to children's science literature; The Washington Post/Children's Book Guild Award for Non-fiction; the Jeremiah Ludington Award for his outstanding contribution to children's nonfiction; the Empire State Award for excellence in literature for young people; and the Lifetime Achievement Award from the National Forum on Children's Science Books.

In a recent interview Simon was asked if he ever thinks of retiring. "I seem to be working faster and harder than ever. I absolutely don't feel any urge to sit back and look at what I've done. The only things that I'm thinking about are things I'd like to do in the future. I'm planning and doing and continuing to write. It's what I love to do. I remember a story about an anthropologist going to talk to a tribe and he asked them what was their word for "work." Their response was they have no word for work. Everybody does the things that they do in their life. I love that response. I don't differentiate between work and play. Everything I do is something that I enjoy doing - the writing, the research and everything else."

Seymour Simon writes and photographs nature from his hilltop home in Columbia County in upstate New York, where he lives with his wife Liz Nealon.

You can follow Seymour on Facebook and on Twitter, as well as on his website, which offers free, downloadable Teacher Guides to his books for educators, parents and homeschoolers, as well as the popular Seymour Science Daily Blo

Reviews

[Manybooks · Rating 2 out of 5]

REVIEW OF THE 1989 EDITION (OPEN LIBRAY)

Now while with the original 1989 edition of Whales Seymour Simon certainly does provide a decently thorough general introduction to both toothed and baleen whales, showing his potential readers that whales are not fish but mammals, that toothed whales tend to hunt while most baleen whales actually even with their gigantic sizes consume mostly krill and plankton (and indeed with Simon’s featured text for Whales being informative without too much textual denseness and overuse of easily confusing scientific jargon), the total absence of a bibliography in Whales, the rather lacklustre at best criticism of both whaling in an of itself and of modern whaling nations, this especially really does tend to make me majorly and angrily cringe, to not really consider recommending the 1989 edition of Whales and to also point out that the updated, that the more recent edition of Whales (from 2006) would indeed only be deemed acceptable for me and to me if Seymour Simon would in fact include at least some bibliographic sources and to also offer much more denigration and active condemnation of and for whaling in general and of and for nations that still practice large scale whale “harvesting” and consider this somehow as being acceptable and their so-called cultural and economic birthright and justification (like Japan, Iceland and Norway, and which should all be both named and strongly shamed by the author and unfortunately are not).

And thus, even though Whales certainly does show a textually tolerable general introduction to whales (and all accompanied by visually stunning photographs), the mentioned above lack of presented secondary sources and that in my opinion Seymour Simon should definitely be brave enough to unilaterally be condemning of not only historic but also of current, of modern day large scale whaling, this has most definitely massively and severely lessened my reading pleasure, and to the point that personally and in my not so humble opinion, Whales in its 1989 incarnation is but a two star ranking at best (and well, that Whales also contains no information whatsoever on cetacean evolution and how whales over the course of millions of years moved from dry land into the oceans, this I also feel to be a serious information hole with regard to Seymour Simon’s textual representation).

[Robert · Rating 3 out of 5]

My classroom library has many Seymour Simon books. I am not certain where they came from. Each year, there is usually a student or two who reads them. This year, not so much.

One of the reasons I am participating in the #classroombookaday is to expose students to a variety of genres, so out came this book today.

Pretty straightforward but fascinating nonetheless. The reader learns about various whales, their songs, where they live, their numbers, how they eat, etc. The students definitely enjoyed this book.

I noted that some of the other Seymour Simon books were read the next couple days. ;)

[Beverly · Rating 3 out of 5]

This book does a good job of briefly introducing various species of whales (humpbacks, sperms, right whales, grays, fins, minkes, blues) and dolphins (orcas). It discusses the differences between toothed and baleen whales and the food chains of both.
Unfortunately, he states: "there is no record that an orca has ever caused a human death." Even though Dawn Brancheau was not drowned until 2010, 4 years after the publication of this book; the same orca, Tilikum, contributed to the deaths of two other people--in 1991 and 1999 (https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-can...). I guess he didn't do his research. No index or bibliography.

[Gatto · Rating 3 out of 5]

As promised by the title, this book is about Whales. It is a basic setup of nice picture on on side and information on the other side. The language used is specific to ocean life, making this a challenge of the child does not have prior knowledge and vocabulary.

It occurs to me that getting a lot of great whale pictures is immensely challenging.

[Jennifer Nolan · Rating 3 out of 5]

Genre: Informational
Unique Feature: There are more recent and older pictures in the book, along with an index and glossary on the back cover
Grades that could benefit from reading this: 3-5, heavier reading content
Date Completed: 2/11/2018

[Jc · Rating 4 out of 5]

I think whales must be some of the most interesting mammals on the planet.

[Elly Schultz · Rating 4 out of 5]

Genre: Informational Grade: 2-5
I think that it is interesting to learn about the different kinds of whales. When being able to learn about whales it had mentioned that they are the largest mammals. This helps us as the readers know that they are very wide.

[Beata Malinowska · Rating 2 out of 5]

Well, despite the fact that I did not find this book appealing, I must admit that it is very educational. It can be a good resource for teachers to talk in the classroom about different species of whales. The illustrations which correspond to the text are in fact real photos of whales, so children can just focus on looking for their physical differences. However, I think that this picture book resembles an article: we have only concrete information about whales, and real, but still, monotonous illustrations. Moreover, there is too much of specialized terminology which can be problematic for younger readers and may discourage them from reading further.

[Emily Levings · Rating 3 out of 5]

Seymour, S. (1989). Whales. New York: Scholastic, Inc.

This is a non fiction book about whales, and it teaches children many unknown facts about whales. I think this is appropriate for children ages 6 through 9 because it is a book that has a lot of vocabulary that would be hard for younger children to understand. I enjoyed reading this book because I learned some new things about whales that I didn't know before. So I would recommend this book to an early childhood science teacher who wanted to teach their kids about whales.

[Carolinee · Rating 2 out of 5]

I don't think that children would be attracted by this particular picture book. Even though the photographs are amazing, it may be boring for children (and not only!) to see similar pictures on each page. There is no storyline, just cold facts about whales. Of course, it fulfills its informative function because the reader may get to know some information about the whales and become interested in the topic. I would say that it is for children who have already been interested in whales or animals in general.

[Jackie · Rating 2 out of 5]

My 5 year old brought this home from his school library and we read it together. I thought it was very interesting, but also bland.. I felt like I was reading a book that I/he needed for a report about whales. He got excited when I expanded on some of the facts, but really it was above him by quite a bit. I think this book would be a better fit for the 4th/5th grader that is really interested and in love with whales.

[Agnieszka Cłapka · Rating 1 out of 5]

Incredibly informative, but not entertaining at all. The book may serve as a great resource to use during science classes, or as a substitute of an educational movie about whales. Perhaps useful when one has to write a school paper about whales. The pictures, though, are quite OK and very realistic. Another advantage is the fact that all the pieces of information are logically organized and structured.

[Ashley Allen · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is a great informational book. I would use this book in my classroom to talk about the different speices of whales. I would talk about their physical differences and let the children draw pictures of whales. I would use this book to talk about how whales migrate, surtvive, and where they live.

[Donna · Rating 3 out of 5]

Helpful overview of whales. But the photographs are not the usual quality found in a Simon book. They are often murky or only partial shots of the animals which makes it hard to see the differentiating features among the animals.

[Heather · Rating 3 out of 5]

Excellent book for science, teaching about mammals, specifically whales.

[Megan · Rating 2 out of 5]

There was a lot of information in this book. If I were to use it, it could augment a science lesson. However, I predict that as a nonfiction text, students would not automatically be drawn to it.