Is a Blue Whale the Biggest Thing There Is?

Wells of Knowledge Science

by Robert E. Wells

The blue whale is the biggest creature on Earth. But a hollow Mount Everest could hold billions of whales! And though Mount Everest is enormous, it is pretty small compared to the Earth. This book is an innovative exploration of size and proportion.

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

Paperback

First published January 1, 1993

About the author

About Robert Wells
Robert E. Wells is the author and illustrator of many intriguing and award-winning science books for children. He lives with his wife in Wenatchee, Washington.


Welcome Robert E. Wells’s books into your classroom, and you’ll find most of
your science curriculum covered. The twelve volumes – engaging and informative,
educational and inviting – provide second through fifth graders with lessons in
science and math from astronomy to weather; from biology to measurement.
Beyond the solid information that is the core of each book, Wells also introduces
concepts that offer students deeper understanding of the subjects at hand. His
conversational tone and thought-provoking questions will lead children to questions
of their own. And that is the beginning of all scientific learning.

Reviews

[Laura (Book Scrounger) · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is a fun way to introduce children to just how big our universe is. It goes through several comparisons of how even big things are pretty small when compared to much bigger things, and involves humorous illustrations in the process: a stack of Mount Everests on Earth's surface, a giant crate of sun-sized oranges, etc. You definitely feel pretty small by the end of it.

[Barbara Radisavljevic · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is a book for all ages, to illustrate and explain the relative sizes of large from a blue whale all the way to the whole universe. The opening picture shows an elephant, horse, and lion standing on a pier watching the tale of a blue whale that is larger than all of them combined. Then he
shows the same animals looking at a jar that contains 100 blue whales. He then puts two such jars on a platform with the animals between them. With the animals still standing on the bottom platform, Wells draws a stack of platforms ten high and then on the next page puts them on top of Mount
Everest to show how small they are in comparison. By this time the animals are no longer visible. Wells goes on and on until he reaches the universe itself, having introduced numbers in the millions and billions along the way. Even adults will find this book, and others in this series
fascinating. Other titles include WHAT'S SMALLER THAN A PYGMY SHREW,WHAT'S FASTER THAN A SPEEDING CHEETAH (Explores speed from the ostrich and cheetah to the speed of light), and HOW DO YOU LIFT A LION (comparative
weights).

[Quynh Le · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is wonderful and silly book for students to discover just how big the world really is along with measurement terms such as feet and ton. I liked all of the pictures and I think students will have fun discovering and learning about all the different things mentioned. They can also think about their own life and come up with anything that they remember as being really big, such as a building or a giraffe at the zoo. An activity students can do is estimate things such as how many students will it take to reach the top of the school or how many pencils will it take to circle the classroom, etc, using something small to measure something much bigger.

[Karen · Rating 3 out of 5]

Read many times throughout the years. Part of Sonlight curr.

[R. L. Peterson · Rating 3 out of 5]

This was an interesting science book for kids!

[Shelby Beasley · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is an adorable, slightly ridiculous book that informs the reader about the universe. Starting with a blue whale, the narrator shows the reader things that are larger and larger until we reach the universe.
I love this book because it is just silly enough to keep the reader's attention. Putting whales in jars isn't something that you normally think about, but it gets the point across. With fun illustrations and text placement, this book is enjoyable from start to finish.
I love that this book makes the reader wonder. Is anything bigger than Mount Everest? It makes kids wonder about the world around them. I would use this book to incite wonder in my kids specifically for the purposes of science. If I can get them to ask the questions instead of me providing them, they will have a far more enriching experience.

[Yasmin Gomez Geng]

This is such an adorable little book! First off, the size is a bit odd because it much longer than it is wide. However, as soon as you open the book, you see why this is: the shape of the pages makes it easy to create the illustrations of size that the author wants to show.

Through this book, readers will be able to read and see how a blue whale is NOT the biggest thing there is. The intro is really cute (and informative) because it familiarizes and prepares readers to see the words "millions", "billions", and other big counting words.

Grade: 1st Grade to 3rd Grade
Topic: Math, Animals, Size

[Megan DeHart · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book is great for introducing the concept of how big things really are. It starts with a blue whale beside some smaller animals, then shows how many whales it would take to equal Mt Everest, how many Earths it would take to fit in the sun; going further and further until we reach the universe. It really puts things in perspective for the reader, how small our world really is in the great scheme of things, and is a great read to help children understand the concepts of millions and billions.

[Ebookwormy1 · Rating 4 out of 5]

A clear and clever text with wonderful illustrations that explains the size of the universe! Great presentation of a concept I would have thought beyond preschoolers. Parents enjoy reading it too! We did have to do a little explanation about Mount Everest, but that was easily remedied with a map and internet photos.

The preschool designation is merely a starting point. This one will be in circulation for years. Home School Library essential.

[Yadira · Rating 3 out of 5]

This book gives examples of different perspectives. It shows animals that are bigger than each other. The book has great illustrations to allow students to see how big an animal is compared to something else. For example, the "flipper" part of the whale is bigger than most of the Earth's creatures. It also compares 100 full sized Earths in a big bag to the sun. The sun is still bigger than that.

[Japonika Finch · Rating 5 out of 5]

There are so many ways this book can be used within a classroom. It's a great way to involve children in the concept of estimation and they really get into guessing "how many" or trying to predict the very biggest thing there is. Early elementary age children will enjoy the challenge of seeing how long it takes to count to 100 and then guessing how long it might take to reach a larger number. There are some many teachable moments that can occur when using this book.

[Portable · Rating 5 out of 5]

Great for older K2s and for talking about questions, answering questions and finding information from books. This is also a great book for introducing mathematical concepts and comparing size. The illustrations help to give a sense of perspective about just how large our universe really is - taking us a journey from whales in the ocean out into the world, and the universe. Marvelously thought provoking.

[Isabel Hernandez · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book is perfect to help kindergarten students getting familiar with the idea of relative size. My ESOL students specially struggle with what is bigger than and smaller than a thing. This book is a great conversation starter about size, bigger, and smaller. For the older grades this book can be used to introduce lessons on place value and big numbers.

[Rebecca Martin · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is an interesting book! I would read this book and then have my students bring in one object from their home the next day. The next day we could place them in order from smallest to largest. Another activity they could do is measure their height, record it on a table on the whiteboard, and then arrenge themselves from shortest to tallest.

[Katrina Kim · Rating 4 out of 5]

Illustration are comparative to what the content is intended to teach.

Concepts taught:
*Comparing and contrasting (Separation chart)
* Proportions
* Quantity
* Measurements
ex.) big, bigger, and biggest

Variety of things are compared in this story like a blue whale, a mountain, a star, and the universe.

Discuss:
Universe, what is it? This can be a transition into to science!

[Emmie · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is one of our science books for our Pre-K Sonlight curriculum and it was fun to read. It's a good look at giving perspective on how small we really are compared to everything else. I like that it is very basic science for kids who want to learn but are not yet ready for the concept that often go with science.

[T Crockett · Rating 4 out of 5]

I read this to a group ranging from 4-11 yrs old. The kids on the younger end were really impressed. The older kids kept trying to guess what the author was going to say was the largest thing there is. So they were interested, but a lot of the material was already familiar.

I thought the author did a great job of putting hard to imagine sizes in perspective.

[Brandy Shark · Rating 4 out of 5]

I'll read almost anything with a whale on it regardless of the target audience. This was a nice science book that demonstrated the concept of size and space. By comparing big things to other big things and then even bigger things,the author makes the concept of galaxies and the universe much easier to grasp at an elementary level.

[Nora Manriquez · Rating 3 out of 5]

This book is a good book to learn about what is bigger than a blue whale. I wouldn't read this book to young children maybe a 5 year old would like this because it has a lot of big words that young children may not understand. This would be a good book to have in the classroom but not a good book to read to a whole class.

[Holly Wheeler · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book is very unique, it is a good way to introduce more science to young students. Students will be amazed about how big the universe is and how small things are. It uses kids imagination but at the same time teaches facts. I really enjoyed this book and would reccommend it!

[Laysha Daulton · Rating 4 out of 5]

Really good book to read. The illustrations are amazing and it’s a really interesting book to read.

[Cameron Cochran · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book puts a perspective on how big our universe truly is. It starts off with a big blue whale, then Mont Everest, then the Earth, then the sun, and an older sun named Antares, then the milky way, and then the whole universe. The book does a great job of explaining the size differences and a perspective of how big different things are in our universe. The illustrations also play a role in showing these perspectives in a fun silly way. I especially love how they put a bunch of earths in a bag and made a bunch of suns into a crate of oranges with a Mont Everest ad on the box. I like how the writing in the book bends and weaves around in the pages and important facts are all spelled out in capital letters. This book can teach kids about how big our universe truly is.

[Rebecca Mallay · Rating 5 out of 5]

My 5- and 6-year-olds loved this book. It introduces the scientific concept of the vastness of the universe in a way that small kids can imagine. My kids laughed at the idea of putting 100 blue whales in jars (or 100 Mt Everests on top of one another, or 100 earths in a bag, etc). They were fascinated by the idea of supergiant stars and the many different galaxies with their billions of stars…
Again, this was a book that was part of their homeschool curriculum and we were supposed to just read a page or two a day to think about it and discuss it, but they made me read it all at once, because they couldn’t wait to find out what the biggest thing was. Highly recommend for budding young scientists.

[Michael Weinraub · Rating 5 out of 5]

I like this book too much! It's based on a brilliant visual and relative concept, and continues through the book to illustrate the absurd bigness of the universe. Yet at the same time it conjures a finite universe, which is not easy to do. Anyway, yes, I love this book too much and my children's minds were similarly blown.

[Sandy · Rating 5 out of 5]

I cannot express how great this book (and the entire series really) is for teaching complex concepts to small children. Using the comparison of a Blue Whale, this book explains just how vast and enormous the universe is. I think I learned a few new things reading it too!

[Sarah · Rating 5 out of 5]

God has created a gigantic universe, yet loves His children.

[Helen · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is a fantastic book for all ages! It demonstrates relative sizes of some of the biggest things around us.

[Jessica · Rating 3 out of 5]

A gift from Sarah at JHMS

This will be helpful in both animal and space studies as it attempts to explain just how big everything is.

Q2021 book.

[KaitandMaddie · Rating 4 out of 5]

I probably loved this even more than the kids did, because yes the vastness of size is wild and awe-inspiring.

[Lindsay Williams · Rating 5 out of 5]

Excellent.