Reptiles are cold-blodded animals, which means that they have a body temperature that constantly changes, not like us mammals that have a body temperature that stays the same. Reptiles lay eggs and they date back to when the prehistoric dinosaurs roamed the earth. Now hardly any of them do roam around since of loss of habitat.
There is a significant difference between dinosaurs and reptiles by the shape of their legs. For a reptile, if you imagine that they have legs like ours, they always bend away from their bodies, which are in the middle, while the legs of dinosaurs are straight, like ours. The closest relative to the dinosaurs is probably the komodo dragon, which has a fierce reputation and is the biggest lizard living on earth. Of course we all know that snakes don't have legs, boas are known to have little legs on the sides of thier bodies to stimulate thier mate.
Reptiles are easily distinguished because they're cold-blooded and have scaly skin. Some reptiles take care of their young, like alligators. You can usually find lizards and snakes at pet stores, and probably the biggest one you'll ever see is the boa constrictor or python, because I don't think there's going to be some normal person with a 30ft+ anaconda in their tank. Snakes, monitors and others can be fed crickets, feeder fish, and white mice (oh joy, seeing something devoured alive). Most snakes in pet stores aren't poisonous (I think we all know why...)
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