Recommendations for a pregnancy/birth book for a child

Cafe Society
1

Here’s the deal: I have a new full time teaching position at an Orthodox Jewish private school. Love it so far. Love. It. It’s definitely a different world from what I’m used to.

One of my students, a sixth grade girl, has declared that she wants to be a doctor when she grows up, and she wants to read about how babies are born. She asked me specifically what books she could read. I want to encourage her curiosity and ambition, because most of the girls are focused on getting married at 18 and making babies, not delivering them.

I need some book recommendations that would be appropriate, not just for an 11 year old girl to learn about gestation and birth, but also appropriate for a deeply sheltered girl from an extremely religiously conservative family. I would prefer the book not mention sex or conception (she didn’t, after all, ask about that), but I understand that most titles will make some mention. It should be technically forthright and detailed, but not squicky. Illustrations would be better than photographs at this point.

Help me out, Dopers. This is one field I have little expertise in.

2

Since most books about birth will probably make some mention of conception, you will probably want to ask her parents before you give her such information. Her parents might object to her reading about such things at her age, and that could cause problems with your employment.

3

Oh, yeah. I plan to clear any and all suggestions with the parents. However, I’d like some suggestions to make before I call them.

4

All the books by William Sears MD and his wife Martha focus on natural childbirth, breastfeeding, and attachment parenting. It’s a bit of a lecture that medical intervention is not the preferred way to birth a baby, but it is generally nice and clear.

My ten year old can read the level that these are written at, and she is not at all
interested in the details of copulation.