Reddit mentions of First Human Body Encyclopedia (DK First Reference)

My kids really like the DK First Human Body Encylopedia.

Edit... This 3D one looks really neat too.

It's Not the Stork is a good one for this age about reproduction. For a more general anatomy book you might try the First Human Body Encyclopedia or My Amazing Body Machine.

I have had a bunch of books, but I have given a lot away to another 3-year-old who loves bodies, so some of the out-of-print or rare books are not easy to find for me. I have this one:

http://www.amazon.com/First-Human-Encyclopedia-Reference-Series/dp/0756609976/ref=pd_sim_b_3?ie=UTF8&refRID=14M5S3ATR6T05TJT3MTQ

I don't have the ones I listed below, but they look interesting. I have always had slightly "older" books than my kids, and let them look at the pictures and read what they were interested in. For example, my 4- and 7-year-olds have some books about the brain and are reading about neuroanatomy and neurotransmitters, and the central and peripheral nervous system, but sometimes they just pick up the books and look at the pictures and learn that the brain is responsible for all kinds of actions and thoughts and sensations.

http://www.amazon.com/Uncover-Human-Body-An-Book/dp/1571457895/ref=pd_tcs_compl_t_3?ie=UTF8&refRID=0991ESGG92BTT0FW65QQ

http://www.amazon.com/Body-Science-Books-Patty-Carratello/dp/1557342113/ref=pd_sim_b_4?ie=UTF8&refRID=1MF77N2TKN3B7D84Y692

Finally, these videos look pretty interesting, but I have not tried them:

http://www.sciencekids.co.nz/videos/humanbody.html

I think it's really normal at 4-5 for kids to be thinking about sameness and differentness and try to make sense of what they see.

The approach I take--after a lot of thought and research--is to teach and talk about skin color the same way we would about eye color or hair color. There are some good books that talk about the science of skin color - First Encyclopedia of the Human Body touches on it--my kid is obsessed with that book, All the Colors We Are takes a matter of fact and scientific approach. The book Children Just Like Me is another really useful resource when talking about different cultures and people.


I've also made a point to buy black, brown and Asian baby dolls and Barbies (not just the standard white ones) since she was about 2. At first I felt really self-conscious about doing this, but I think it's helped her see variety as the norm instead of thinking of her whiteness as normal and everything else as "other."

At this stage, that's the message you want to be instilling - everyone has lots of differences and they're all pretty darn normal and cool.

And finally--how to deal with loud kid comments in public. A few days ago my daughter shouted and pointed, "LOOK MOMMY! A little person!!! THAT'S NOT A KID!" I was embarrassed and felt bad and I told her in the moment that it's not nice to yell out people's differences because it might make them feel like everyone is looking at them--she got that--attention can be embarrassing.

When we got home we talked about dwarfism just like hair color or normal height -- it's something about you that get when you're born. I think I said something like, "even if a person is born to be a little person, their brain grows up just like yours or mine as they get older and when they're grown ups they have jobs and families just like any other grownup." She thought it was really really cool.

I'm sure she'll do it to me again. I don't know if there's a better way to handle it in the moment to be more respectful of others--but my main focus is trying to get a message of inclusiveness to my kid.

I dunno. This stuff is hard.