This nonfiction text includes information for upper elementary and intermediate students. I doubt any child, except the most highly motivated, would read it from cover to cover. However, I could see it being a very useful resource for a research project. It contains a table of contents, glossary (with the defined words bolded throughout the main text itself), index, and a multitude of diagrams and maps. It covers a wide range of information related to oceans -- where they are, what features make them up, what wildlife lives in them, how they affect weather patterns, etc. Personally, I found the pages a little cluttered and overwhelming with their mix of text, photographs, captions, diagrams, pull-out boxes, etc., but this seems to be a popular style for children's nonfiction books. "Geography Detective" boxes call for kids to do something interactive, sometimes a hands-on experiment (e.g., examining how items float in salt water versus in fresh water) or sometimes with a thought activity (e.g., studying a map and determining what bay, strait, and so forth is closest to their own home). As the book was written in the mid-1990s, I thought it might be very dated, but it was not too bad. Most of the information is fairly basic, but I must admit I learned a few new terms myself. ( )