How young is "too young" to explain sex to kids? That isn't something we worry much about. It's the how we could use help with.

Our approach to what schools awkwardly silo as "sex education" is to explore the topic in as much depth as Z seems interested in at any given time, which means that at four she is well versed not just in how pregnancy works but in sperm, eggs, and how they get together. Most of this learning has taken place through long conversations she has initiated and pressed forward,. This often involves us grasping for the right language to describe things on her level without "opening doors" to topics we aren't necessarily ready for, while allowing her to push us as far as she sees fit. Frankly, it's a process that cries out for a manual to help guide some of these discussions and make them more real and comprehensible for children through simple language, detailed diagrams, and some humor.

So we're thrilled to have found Robie Harris' and Michael Emberley's It's Not the Stork: A Book About Girls, Boys, Babies, Bodies, Family, and Friends, a book for kids ages 4 and up that explores a whole host of sexual and procreative topics including:

• the physical differences between boys and girls


• conception, the stages of pregnancy, and childbirth


• puberty


• infant behavior


• family structures (single parents, large and small families and, very subtly, two-mom or two-dad families)


• friendship and "okay" and "not okay" touching

Questions and answers are explored in a way that feels natural, using talking-bubble asides both between a curious young bird and bee who travel through the book's topics and between the many people pictured throughout the book; blocks of narrative text are relatively short, and cover topics in a way that is both breezy and, when facts of physiology and reproduction are involved, quite thorough.

Better yet, It's Not the Stork can be purchased on Amazon.com for under $10!

The authors also have a nice-looking previous book, It's So Amazing!: A Book About Eggs, Sperm, Birth, Babies, and Families. It's So Amazing! is intended for the same age group, and was published in 2004; it isn't clear just how different these two books are, except that It's So Amazing does include brief coverage of sexual abuse and HIV/AIDS, which frankly we'll wait a bit before introducing (. We've found Z at four and a half is fascinated by and entirely comfortable with It's Not the Stork! and would recommend it to anyone looking for this kind of book. - Jeremiah