ABCs of Engineering: The Essential STEM Board Book of First Engineering Words for Kids (Science Gifts for Kids)

Baby University

by Chris Ferrie, Sarah Kaiser

Genres: Childrens, Picture Books, Science, Stem, Nonfiction, Engineering

26 pages, Kindle Edition

First published January 1, 2019

About the author

I am Chris Ferrie, father of four and happy husband. My day job is academic research where I follow my curiosity through the word of quantum physics. My passion for communicating science has led from the most esoteric topics of mathematical physics to more recently writing children’s books.

Reviews

[Hannah]

Sorta triggering lol

[Wendy Cooper · Rating 4 out of 5]

It’s well written but the imageries aren’t enticing, especially for kids. If there are push, pull, slide interactions, the ideas would resonate better and they would make it more engaging.

[Melissa Swistek · Rating 2 out of 5]

I’m not an author, but was this the best way to try and present this info to babies/toddlers? Not very enticing.

[Lou · Rating 4 out of 5]

Great book with simple explanations for how things work. You can read it at different levels depending on where your child is up to.

[Vicki · Rating 1 out of 5]

Guys. Guys! What are you doing? Baby University? What? There's a full paragraph on each page about the engineering concept. THIS IS A BOARD BOOK.

You can sell anything to millennial parents if you put STEM on the endcap. No offense to whoever gave this to me at my shower - I fully understand the impulse. But my baby has NO TIME for a three minute per page exposition on the freaking Carnot Engine.

If my kid goes to MIT because she became obsessed with this book at age 3 I will come back and eat crow. But seriously: Baby University is not a thing, nor should it be.

[Angie markiewicz · Rating 5 out of 5]

An excellent resource for the preschool classroom. I see some reviews complain that it is a board book…really that just means hard cover and durable to use for many years to come. I put this out during certain activities or brought out sour of the moment to use as a starting point/resource for discussion topics. Anything from designing our own block structure to discussing the powers of super hero’s can be referenced with this book.

For those saying this is to “advanced” for young children, they are more capable than you know.

[Andrés · Rating 1 out of 5]

Similar to the ABCs of Physics, this book is a total snooze / abandon for babies and toddlers. Maybe slightly more exciting illustrations would bump this up to 2 stars, but the content is too heavy, even for adults who probably need to slow down to digest the content and maybe even google a few things later. The exposure to novel science words is great, but leave it at that if you absolutely must write and publish books like this.

[Kris · Rating 4 out of 5]

Again, too complex for a board book, but the set-up is good. It would have been excellent as a non-fiction picture book geared toward elementary schoolers. Board book implies baby/toddler, and this is just too much for them, even in its simplest form. I like it - the format should be different, though.

[Christina C · Rating 2 out of 5]

The explanations are a bit too complex for a board book but a prosodic reading with pointing to illustrations can help keep a child’s interest. The issue is the illustrations. Large, colorful drawings hold children’s interest. There is too much white space and muted colors. A unique idea but a missed opportunity.

[Sarah Jewett · Rating 5 out of 5]

The abc collection is just impressive. 3 reading levels on 1 page! Your child will grow with these board books.

[Freddie D · Rating 4 out of 5]

An alphabet primer with three levels of learning and perfect for engaging young minds in STEM.

[Aarvik · Rating 4 out of 5]

Nice read, sometimes complicated for 4 year young’s 😅

[Erin · Rating 5 out of 5]

Nice conceptual overview of many important engineering concepts.

[Hannah · Rating 3 out of 5]

This was quite technical for a baby book...although it's probably more for the parents than the baby? I was surprised to see paragraphs on every page. It is informative for sure, and the illustrations are very textbooky. I got some flashbacks when I saw all of the electrical stuff because electricity physics was my worst nightmare. There is a wide variety of engineering disciplines featured. For civil, I was excited to see hydraulics, keystone, tolerance, yield, and zoning.

[Wendy D · Rating 4 out of 5]

Chris Ferrie,
Do the world even more justice and write one of these for every subject in school that exists. For some reason, we start students on step 2. They first need the language as step 1!
This was really helpful!