Encyclopedia Set

Yes! I loved encyclopedias as a girl, too, and have wanted to get a set for our family for a long time. I have four boys, 7 and younger, who are full of questions, and I don’t want to be always whipping out my phone to investigate. I want them to know how to search for answers in books, and delight in the process!

My mom and I came upon a set of World Book encyclopedias at a thrift store for $6. What a treasure! It’s from 1991 and is missing volume “E”, but so far that has only come up once. It doesn’t bother me to have an older set, because most of the things my boys are curious about would not be outdated. For the things that need more current knowledge, we can look those up in other ways. I find my boys tucked in various corners of the house with one (or several) volumes, pouring over them — even my pre-reading boys. They have favorite volumes, too, where they have learned to find one of their loves — my 6 year old favors “M” where he returns again and again to the “motorcycle” entry. 🙂 Encyclopedias are a great tool for teaching kids how to find what they’re looking for alphabetically!

To answer your question more directly, I grew up with World Book and I still love them now. They are very child and family friendly, with a good number of pictures. For the human body (at least up to the 1991 edition; my parents’ set had it too) there is a nifty set of overlays to see various body systems. I continued to refer to them through high school. You can find sets online, even at Amazon. New sets are quite expensive, but you can also find used sets, even just a few years old, much more reasonably.

I hope you find what you’re looking for! Happy exploring to your daughter!

Melissa 🙂

P.S. World Book also published (and apparently still does) a set for children called “Childcraft: The How and Why Library.” Each volume, rather than being organized alphabetically, is based on a particular topic. Places to Know, World and Space, Make and Do, Stories and Poems…and quite a few more. This may not be what you’re looking for, but it’s also a lot of fun. We have a set of those my parents gave us (from my childhood), and my boys love those, too. My 7 year old asked me one day how toothpaste was put into tubes, and I didn’t know. A couple days later, he was looking through the “How Things Work” volume, and there it was! He was very excited. 🙂 You can see Childcraft here.

I have 2 sets of Childcraft books!   We have a 1967 Canadian 100th Birthday set, and another set from the 1980’s (the 1980’s set was missing the book 1, and we got a book 1 from a different year.)  The one set was given us, and the other I had bought for a few bucks at a garage sale.   I love these books.   My kids love book 1 (more the 1967 set).  I do see some of them in their bedrooms at times, so I guess they might be reading them (my kids are NOT kids that just read stuff for fun…)

But one thing I wanted to mention – the 2 sets are pretty much entirely different except that book 1 is nursery rhymes and poetry.   So the newer book has a fantastic math book.  The older one has a book about inventions.   etc.

We did have a set of World Book Encyclopedias (also about 1967 though) and they were just not getting used at all, so we got rid of them to get shelf space.   I really do wish we had one that was more up to date.  I worry that they would never get used…. but I was the kid that eventually read the entire set from cover to cover.

I have a 15 volume set of Childcraft – The How and Why Library with Dictionary and Parent Guide to sell if anyone else is looking.

I also have a set of Collier, The World’s Greatest Events (10 Vol.) and Greatest Short Stories (6 vol.) for sale.

They are all in like new condition and look absolutely gorgeous on a shelf!

Blessings,
Melissa

Childcraft*