What do you think?
Rate this book
All About...
All About Turtles
From the author of the Crinkleroot series, a boldly illustrated picture book captures the traits and characteristics of land and sea turtles in their natural habitats.
26 pages, Hardcover
First published August 31, 2000
3 people are currently reading
73 people want to read
About the author
Jim Arnosky
162 books76 followersJim Arnosky was born in New York City, NY Sept 1, 1946. He was raised in Pennsylvania. Jim graduated from high school in Philadelphia and joined the US Naval Reserves. His active duty took him to Maryland and Bremerhaven, Germany.
In 1976 Jim and his wife Deanna moved to Vermont with their two daughters where they have lived in an old farmhouse for the past 28 years. 17 of those years were spent raising sheep.
Jim is self taught in writing, art and the natural sciences. He has written and illustrated 86 books on nature subjects and has illustrated 46 other books written by various authors. He has been awarded the Christopher Medal, Orbis Pictus Honor, ALA Gordon Award, and Outstanding Science book awards from National Science Teachers Associations.
Jim loves to fish, boat, and play his guitar. In his work, he uses a Betacam SP video camcorder with a 1600 mm lens to record the wildlife he and Deanna find all across the country.
In 1976 Jim and his wife Deanna moved to Vermont with their two daughters where they have lived in an old farmhouse for the past 28 years. 17 of those years were spent raising sheep.
Jim is self taught in writing, art and the natural sciences. He has written and illustrated 86 books on nature subjects and has illustrated 46 other books written by various authors. He has been awarded the Christopher Medal, Orbis Pictus Honor, ALA Gordon Award, and Outstanding Science book awards from National Science Teachers Associations.
Jim loves to fish, boat, and play his guitar. In his work, he uses a Betacam SP video camcorder with a 1600 mm lens to record the wildlife he and Deanna find all across the country.
Ratings & Reviews
Friends & Following
Create a free account to discover what your friends think of this book!
Community Reviews
Displaying 1 - 11 of 11 reviews
February 2, 2021
Prolific picture-book author and artist Jim Arnosky, who has created so many engaging works of natural history for young children, turns to the turtle in this sixth entry in his All About... series, intended to introduce youngsters to different categories of animal. Reptiles with shells, turtles live in a variety of habitats, from fresh and saltwater, to land. There are more than two hundred turtle species, worldwide, and Arnosky highlights a number of them. He also discusses their anatomy, their feeding habits, and their reproductive cycles. In the end, he concludes that they are survivors, creatures that have flourished since the time of the dinosaurs...
Like so many of Arnosky's books, I found All About Turtles both informative and engaging, appreciating the information being imparted, and enjoying the gorgeous watercolor artwork. I learned a few new things - I never knew that turtle shells were so sensitive, embedded with so many nerves, or that the bottom part of a turtle's shell (the plastron) is convex in females, and concave in males - and think that young children will as well. That said, I did feel that Arnosky missed an opportunity here to clarify the terms turtle, tortoise and terrapin, which would have been helpful. He does use the word tortoise, when discussing the gopher tortoise, but he doesn't explicitly state that tortoises are the subgroup of turtles that live on land, just as terrapins are the subgroup that live in fresh water. That was a disappointment, as was the lack of further reading ideas, something I always miss, in the books in this series. Leaving that aside, this was still an engaging book, and is one I would recommend to young animal lovers, and to picture-book readers interested in turtles.
Like so many of Arnosky's books, I found All About Turtles both informative and engaging, appreciating the information being imparted, and enjoying the gorgeous watercolor artwork. I learned a few new things - I never knew that turtle shells were so sensitive, embedded with so many nerves, or that the bottom part of a turtle's shell (the plastron) is convex in females, and concave in males - and think that young children will as well. That said, I did feel that Arnosky missed an opportunity here to clarify the terms turtle, tortoise and terrapin, which would have been helpful. He does use the word tortoise, when discussing the gopher tortoise, but he doesn't explicitly state that tortoises are the subgroup of turtles that live on land, just as terrapins are the subgroup that live in fresh water. That was a disappointment, as was the lack of further reading ideas, something I always miss, in the books in this series. Leaving that aside, this was still an engaging book, and is one I would recommend to young animal lovers, and to picture-book readers interested in turtles.
December 13, 2023
We really enjoy reading books by Jim Arnosky. His illustrations are terrific and we love how he is able to write nonfiction books for children that are interesting and do not overwhelm the reader with too many details.
This is a terrific book about turtles. We are big fans of turtles and have had several as pets and/or temporary visitors and we love to learn more about them.
We've read lots of books about turtles, but we learned something new in this book: "Turtle shells are made of colorless bone. It is the hard, horn-like skin covering the shell that gives a turtle its color and markings." (p. 14)
Interestingly enough, the day after we read this fact, we went to a spring festival that had a table with a few old turtle shells - we saw up close the colorless bone contrasted with skin on them and I loved that I was able to share this discovery with our girls.
This is a terrific book about turtles. We are big fans of turtles and have had several as pets and/or temporary visitors and we love to learn more about them.
We've read lots of books about turtles, but we learned something new in this book: "Turtle shells are made of colorless bone. It is the hard, horn-like skin covering the shell that gives a turtle its color and markings." (p. 14)
Interestingly enough, the day after we read this fact, we went to a spring festival that had a table with a few old turtle shells - we saw up close the colorless bone contrasted with skin on them and I loved that I was able to share this discovery with our girls.
November 27, 2018
It was interesting reading this nonfiction book after reading a fiction piece about turtles by the same author. They had a lot in common! This book was difficult to read aloud since there are a lot of sidebars, but there was a lot of good information here, and I did enjoy it.
May 30, 2018
My boys really liked this book. The illustrations are very appealing, and it is a great beginners book about turtle facts.
May 31, 2019
Through accurate and descriptive illustrations and very interesting facts, the reader gets to learn all about turtles. Easy to read and understand.
October 30, 2019
Factual book about turtles, beautiful illustrations
February 2, 2017
This book talks about turtles. It gives very good information about turtles. It tells how they live, where they live, the food they eat, different kinds of turtles, how babies are born, and the anatomy of the turtles.
I enjoyed this book. It wasn't the best book I've read because it gets a little wordy, and there are several pages that are hard to read due to black letters on a dark background.
This book would be great to use for teaching a class how to research using a book. It's packed full of great information to teach them how research.
I enjoyed this book. It wasn't the best book I've read because it gets a little wordy, and there are several pages that are hard to read due to black letters on a dark background.
This book would be great to use for teaching a class how to research using a book. It's packed full of great information to teach them how research.
Read
April 24, 2016This book is all about turles. They are reptiles with shells. They warm themselves by moving to a sunlit spot. This book has good illustrations, and along with each illustration it has a caption explaining what the picture is or what type of turtle it is. Young turtles feed on insects, larger turtles eat plants, insects, worms, etc. One of the illustrations shows the size difference in eggs between a sea turtle, snapping turtle, and a painted turtle.
December 7, 2014
All about turtles is a great informational book for children. The way the book is set up is that it describes the ways turtles are built and their daily life. For example, on some pages it has diagrams of different turtles and the name of each one of them. It also has fun facts about them and how they survive. This is a great book for children.
July 27, 2011
very brief information on the broad topic of turtles with very little specific information good introduction book
Read
May 30, 2017Paired with Tudley Didn't Know
Displaying 1 - 11 of 11 reviews