My four year old stunned us last night when he asked what evolution was. Where do you start? I posed the question to my friends on Twitter:
“My four year old just asked me what evolution is. Where do you start? What do you say?”
There were some great replies that I list here:
Mark said: would be way easier to just point at a priest and say “talk to him”…
Neil: I’d start with giraffes.
Alex: Why everything alive is the way it is.
Kerron: Tell them evolution is easier to explain after a few years. 
#irony
Mo: start with how your kids look different, but similar, to you. extrapolate from there.
Matt: Great question, but I see the dilemma of what it opens up for one so young . Maybe a trip to Natural History Museum for demo.
James: Apparently Dawkins is working on a childrens book…
Dave: Evolution is like revolution but more gentle.
Graham: easy, you get a copy of Spore for your boy’s Mac and get playing. It’s been a hit with my 2!
Redmamba (my current favourite answer): sometimes amongst a crowd one or two or more individuals decide to be kinder and considerate, then they do what they believe
Jeffrey: How’s this? Evolution: the series of big and little events and changes that make species more suited to where and how they live
Alberto: a great excuse to visit the national history and science museums
Alan: Show him Darwin’s picture series showing a chimp becoming a human?
Pascal: …. on the first day …
Judith: With the soup.
Kelly: Act out the classic ape to human trasition. (To which Mrs Watson commented that I often appear to be doing that in reverse).
Karen: I’d start with amphibians & sort of work around that. Will he ask about God?
Kath: I’d pick a species & google for images of stages & use that
Stef: start with breeds of pets. oh wait, it’s a birdsandbees question when asked by a four year old, innit?
Tom: read them the book of Genesis. Clear, concise, informative and word for word exactly how it all began.
Barry: http://twitter.com/shekalyn/status/3192257279
Chris: http://www.swarthmore.edu/N… Try this
Sebastian: Buy them spore? 
Josh: survival of the fittest. In school the example was always giraffes with long necks being better than those with short necks.
Martin: My first intro to evolution was pale fritillary moths turning dark as pollution forced them to change their camouflage.
Ron: Say how we’re all a bit like our parents & that only the giraffes with long necks survived to get the nice leaves at treetop
I checked out on Amazon and there were a few books avaiable. Our Family Tree: An Evolution Story
So there’s a gap in the market for a four year old’s guide to evolution. Do you know of any other books that might help?
11 comments ↓
The Futurama Film “Into the Wild Green Yonder” contains a 30 second brilliant explanation.
It starts of with a snake and a frog, who both want an apple on a tree. The snake climbs onto the frog to reach it.
Take 2: When the snake climbs up, the frog opens its mouth an eats the snake.
Take 3: When the frog tries to eat the snake, the snake inflates and chokes the frog.
And so on…
A quick search on Youtube found exactly what I was describing: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EjpziQQnyNo
Hope he is as quick to learn as he is sharp to ask a good question! If evolution is to survive, halting the decline in bio-diversity – climate related – now (for the first time?) happening faster than new additions is urgent?
a short haiku – “Live with me and my rules, moderation in everything except vegetables” is a recipe for future evolution/survival which mini Darwen Watson might adopt, and start to teach us what to do! He’s obviously one to keep Dad on his toes – hope your’e enjoying recess – I am!
Speaking as a children’s author, particularly of science books, I can confirm that there is a gap, but not a market. UK publishers won’t buy a children’s book about evolution. Almost all children’s non-fiction published in the UK must have a US market to make it viable and the US won’t buy books about evolution because too many schools and libraries (and some whole states) refuse to stock them. Because of the mad nutter fundamentalists who like to teach creationism. So kids in the UK can’t learn about evolution (or, while we’re on the topic, hedgehogs, sausages, wardrobes, Tibet – because books are printed in China…) It could do with some exposure, this censoring of UK books by the US market. If only someone in government would take an interest…
Good question by Watson minor! We look forward to welcoming him aboard.
My bog standard comprehensive made a bad job of explaining it to me at 17. We need a really talented illustrator and science writer to produce a book about this.
And you need to slap silly any of your colleagues who let an iota of creationist/Intelligent Design teaching near a state funded science classroom and stop the dumbing down of the science curriculum.
long, long, long ago, when the world began every animal had to learn to get food, friends and keep safe. The ones who could do it best had babies who were cleverer/taller, quicker than their mums and dads. Then answer any questions as honestly and simply as you can.
Four years old. He’s old enough to know where his species came from. Explain that all life is related and people are just an ape species, most closely related to chimpanzees. HIs interest in science can only grow from there.
My daughter asked questions about evolution from about 4, and so did her friends, and their questions haven’t stopped…um…evolving. Your respondents who suggest ‘starting with’ museums or experiments are the way to go. You can’t just answer a question like that. You have to start a lifetime of enquiry. So much of learning about life on earth comes down to thinking about this basic concept (I won’t say ‘truth’). So, it’s a wonder then that the new Primary curriculum for Science fails to mention evolution:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/science/2009/jul/28/evolution-primary-schools
Maybe you can have a word with someone about it?
You could just tell him to ask his Gran/Granddad we know about these things.
This reminds me of a church service I attended a few months ago where people were asked to bring in examples of God’s creation. One chap brought in a picture of him and his son standing on a beach in the Galapagos Islands.
It seems that the peppered moth http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peppered_moth_evolution is to be joined by the deer mouse as a new icon of recent evidence of evolution.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/earth/hi/earth_news/newsid_8225000/8225219.stm
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