this reader seemed like a no-brainer for my boys who love dinosaurs and are learning how to read. but i regret buying it and i write so that others don't make the same mistake i did. here is a run-down of the errors:
- the book uses the word "dinosaur" four times before telling how to pronounce it (and claims it's hard to say!)
- "there are no dinosaurs today." what about birds?
- as other reviewers have mentioned, it claims apatosaurus hid underwater.
- in addition to perpetuating the "brontosaurus" error, the book also refers to "anatosaurus" which is more properly known as edmontosaurus.
- it can be confusing to young readers to see "apatosaurus" and "anatosaurus," two similar names among only nine named in the book.
- the book depicts triceratops using its horns for (offensive) fighting, but the more accepted theories are either for defense or for courtship.
- the discussion of what killed the dinosaurs is horribly, horribly, wrong. only three ideas are offered, of which only one (the world got so much hotter that it became difficult to find food) is plausible. the book completely misses the K-T impact hypothesis by stating that maybe a comet "came too near the earth," a profoundly silly misunderstanding that evokes the equally ridiculous 1910 panic when the earth passed through halley's comet's tail. and advancing the idea that mice ate all of the dinosaurs' eggs just promotes scientific illiteracy.
granted, the book does get many things right: plesiosaurs and pteranodons were not dinosaurs, even huge dinosaurs had small eggs, dinosaurs co-existed with other reptiles like crocodiles, the world of the dinosaurs was very different from the world of today, and we don't know a lot about them.
but all told, this book is so full of falsehoods and errors, that you will spend half or more of your time trying to explain to your kids that the book is wrong.