How do you introduce young kids to evolution? It can be a confusing subject for kids. They have a difficult time grasping the vastness of time. BUT that doesn’t mean you can’t introduce the concept! For young kids in early elementary school, the best way is through picture books about evolution!
We are super lucky to live during a time when there are ample resources for teaching our kids science from a young age. Introducing these concepts early will help kids to gradually gain understanding and build vocabulary for these bigger science topics naturally.
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12 Evolution Books for Kids
We start introducing the concept of evolution through picture books when our kids are very young – around 4 years old! Don’t underestimate your kids, just enjoy these wonderful books and then answer any questions they have!
Books for Young Kids
These books ware perfect for introducing evolution to kids from 4 to 7 years old.
This is a fun book that kids can get into & participate in. It shows how all life is connected and is a great first book about evolution!
This book is the perfect introduction to human evolution for little ones. It’s lovely with beautiful illustrations.
Annabelle & Aiden: The Story of Life
This is another beautiful book, with the story of evolution told in verse. There’s a whole series of Annabelle & Aiden books and they all cover different topics.
Stardust Explores Earth’s Wonders
This book starts introducing more concepts in a question and answer format. We also LOVE this book because a kid and her dad wrote it together! There are also other good books in this series.
Want to start talking about the different time periods and the kinds of animals and plants alive during that time? This is the perfect books to lightly introduce all of that!
One Day a Dot: The Story of You, The Universe, and Everything
This is a lovely book that introduces the big concepts of evolution and where everything came from.
Related Post: Ultimate Dinosaur Unit Study
Books for Older Kids
There are some wonderful picture books that go more in depth for older kids to start digging into more of the details about evolution. These books are great for kids 6 and up & even adults could learn a ton from these!
The Story of Life: Evolution is Amazing!
This is my favorite book to introduce more concepts & details about evolution and the history of the world. It’s an incredible book that I highly recommend!
Gorgeous illustrations & the evolutionary journey of many different animals makes this book a must have.
If you want to get more in-depth on human evolution, then this is the book for you. It is filled with beautiful illustrations and gives the information in easily digestible chunks. This is the BEST book on human evolution for kids.
When Fish Got Feet, When Bugs Were Big, & When Dinos Dawned
This is a really fun cartoon prehistory of life on earth. It’s awesome and covers in depth some of the earlier time periods that other books don’t cover as in depth. It’s a seriously awesome book that kids will really enjoy.
Evolution: How We and All Living Things Came to Be
This is a good book that talks about the history of the idea of evolution and also talks about the mechanisms through which evolution works.
Darwin and Evolution for Kids: His Life and Ideas with 21 Activities
I haven’t personally used this book, but it has good reviews and adding hands on projects always helps learning stick better for kids!
Bonus Book for Parents: Evolution: The Human Story
For the younger kid books, all you need to do is add these books to your regular book rotation to start introducing evolution to your kids.
For older kids, I would suggest doing a more focussed unit study on evolution and prehistory.
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