Chris McGowan's Discover Dinosaurs is unquestionably the best blend of information and activities I've seen. Dr. McGowan, who writes in an engaging conversational style, begins before the name dinosaur was devised, with Mary Mantell's roadside discovery of a fossil tooth. He segues neatly through subsequent discoveries, dinosaur diet, movement, size and fellow creatures. The good doctor, head of the Vertebrate Paleontology Department at Toronto's Royal Ontario Museum, smoothly weaves explanation and definition throughout his narrative and pauses appropriately, every other page or so, for projects that illustrate how paleontologists work. He concludes with theories on dinosaur extinction and descendants. The activities include directions for the making of fake fossil footprints and skinprints, measuring strides, computing size and weight gains, experimenting with heat retention, body temperature, body stance, and more. The full color art by Tina Holdcroft is just right, whether straightforward depictions of the narrative or lighthearted renditions of kids engaged in the experiments.
