Children’s book has a modern twist to it
Print Edition
How toxicity melamine and clenbuterol can harm will be answered in the sixth edition of the popular Chinese science book “One Hundred Thousand Whys,” indicating the country’s food safety concerns also spook children.
Melamine and clenbuterol are two chemicals illegally used by dairy producers and farmers, respectively.
Answers to such questions as: “Can we travel back to the Qing Dynasty?” “Why do we sometimes feel so blue?” and “Why are we who we are and not someone else?” will also be incorporated in the new book.
The latest edition of the popular science book series for children will be released tomorrow at the Shanghai Book Fair, 14 years after the fifth edition. It includes 4,500 questions, of which 80 percent are new, with the remaining 20 percent given updated explanations.
Since the release of the first edition in the 1960s, more than 100 million copies have been sold throughout China.
Hong Xingfan, deputy chief editor of the Shanghai-based Juvenile and Children’s Publishing House and publisher of the “Whys” series, said the sixth edition has questions about paleontology, prevention of disasters, aviation, aerospace, weapons and national defense.
The publishing house collected more than 30,000 questions from schools and online platforms, reflecting what children pay attention to today.
Sun Yunxiao, deputy director of the China Youth and Children Research Center, said: “Society will be full of hope, only if each family and teacher provides opportunities for children to ask and think,” he wrote.
However, the sixth edition will not provide exclusive or definite answers to some questions.
“If every question has an answer, science is dead,” said Sun Zhengfan, a member of the non-government science group “Scientific Squirrel” and one of the editors of the new book.
But there are worries that the book will not appeal to all the children, most of whom are hooked online.
“Choices of science books for children and the increasing use of online search engines, such as Baidu and Google, have posed great challenges to the classic science series,” said Ji Shisan, chief executive officer of science website Guokr.com.
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