Children's Wikipedia. Need it?

"Why the sky is blue?"

• How to explain this to a three year old child? About the spectrum - it is still not clear. The simplest explanation I have found is suitable for primary school age.
• And if it’s global: who knows the right literature or online portals? Responses to the children's little things about nature, but for 3-4 year olds. Or do I want too much?
• We have many encyclopedias, good and different. But they do not always help. For example, with the same sky.

Forum thread.

As a child, I had such a book.

For those who suddenly do not know - a book for the smallest curious researchers who have just learned to read. I won’t praise for a long time, but I can safely say - for me, at one time, it was like Wikipedia now. From there I learned the basics of our universe. Very accessible language explained complex issues, even thermonuclear reactions in stars.

But this article is not about a book. It became interesting if there was a similar collection of answers for children on the Internet. It turns out that this is not very cool. A long search revealed only 2 seemingly suitable sites: potomy.ru and children.claw.ru. Let's see what they represent ...

potomy.ru

The project is because Pog.ru is the only online children's encyclopedia that contains a huge amount of material on children's topics.

Oh, the only one! Modestly. But in general, they are almost right.

All answers are moderated and only with a positive assessment are allowed.
Only teachers or educators can register and post an unlimited number of articles on the site potomy.ru for FREE!

You’re sticking, you’re writing articles, you should have fought money! This could be explained by the following line:

We retain your copyrights and a link to your profile and the website of your educational institution is placed at the end of each article you post.

Nothing like that. Maybe I think anonymus is not supposed to know? Registered to clear conscience. No, the authors still remained unknown.

I’ll try to find answers to difficult but popular questions for children. For example, I was wondering why the sky is blue. I found 2 articles, one short, the other more authentic. Here are the explanations of them:

When sunlight penetrates the atmosphere, the gases saturated with air decompose white light into its component parts - spectrum: red, orange, yellow, green, blue, blue, violet. It turns out that among these colors the strip of blue and blue prevails, which is why the sky seems blue.

The air itself is colorless, but when the sun's rays penetrate into it, the light in it breaks up into the main seven colors of the spectrum. As we know, a rainbow also consists of these colors - red, orange, yellow, green, blue, blue, violet. Since more blue is obtained, it therefore seems that the sky is blue-blue.

Why is this more? I understand that it is difficult for children to explain Rayleigh scattering , but lying is also not good.
I would also be interested in explaining why cats purr? I will give the full article.

The developed feline language wonderfully meets the needs of communication with relatives and people. Cats can make sounds that vary in duration, pitch, and timbre. A cat's voice can be shy to ask and urge.
A short open meow means a greeting. Choked meow or loud uterine sounds - complaint, resentment. Fear generates heartbreaking screams. A gentle purr most often means gratitude or pleasure.
According to the observations of French scientists, a cat can make seven consonants: M, N, G, X, F, B and R.

Yes, it conveys emotions. But reading is boring. Usually a cat for a child is a real friend that he sees every day. Therefore, in the list of objects of study he is in the very first lines. Will such an explanation satisfy? Unlikely.

Further I notice the section "To preschool children". Oh, what you need! I'm going there. I see here such a not very convenient grouping: “How?”, “When?”, “Who?”, “Why?”, Etc., a total of 17 sections. I look through the questions "Why ...". In general, the questions are very interesting. Sometimes they come across not quite for preschool children. Just imagine, a 5-year-old child comes up to you and asks “Why is the value of money determined by gold?” Or “Why is the Egyptian queen Nefertiti always painted in profile?” And even “Why didn't Schubert complete the 'Unfinished Symphony'?” Although maybe the children are now so advanced, but I just fell behind.

Well, all right, I’d better look at the article “Why is the nettle burning?” It is clearly explained about the villi with acid. I also learned that "If you very strongly break off the nettle, these villi will break at the base and their ends will not be able to penetrate the skin, that is, there will be no irritation." Unfortunately, it is not said why nettle needs this acid and whether it is dangerous.

I read a few more answers. Most consist of 2-5 small paragraphs. In general, it is quite interesting and written in an understandable language, but not enough. After reading, I still have questions.

children.claw.ru

The first to greet me was a healthy banner. The cross was found in the lower left corner, I press. Oh, miracle, the banner just silently disappeared! Now you can look around. Advertising above, right and bottom. One of the links suggested lengthening you know what, and the other to make it thicker.
There is no description of the encyclopedia, or I searched poorly. But it’s written that it’s for children. Left 6 sections. There are no questions about the blue sky and purring cats (well, how can it be), so I’m just looking at the Earth and the Universe section. So why do the stars flicker?

At first glance, the planet and the star are really very similar. But if you look closely, you will notice that the stars flicker, and the planets shine with an even calm light. This is because the stars, like our Sun, are a hot gas ball, and the planets do not have their own light, we see them because they reflect the sunlight falling on their surface.

That is not the reason at all. By the way, for example, Jupiter on the horizon also flickers.

I spent some more time there, but I will not tire, I will immediately summarize. There are a lot of articles (but not about cats). Written in a dry form, somehow messy. Do you know what they remind me of? But such topics like: "London - the capital of Great Britain", etc. Still trouble with answers to difficult questions. In general, the encyclopedia is not very children's: “V. Herschel was the first to conduct targeted and systematic observations of binary stars by measuring the angular distances between their components. ”

I think it would be nice to create an analogue of Wikipedia for children. Accessible to everyone for editing. However, it is probably necessary to pre-moderate the changes. Simple experiences are very desirable for better reinforcement and understanding. For example, to explain the blueness of the sky, you can pass a narrow beam through the aquarium. It will also be like Perelman’s books. It seems to me that there is something to think about.