What do your kids call their genitals?

[BellissimoGecko]

Not a troll, honest! I'm editing a book aimed at kids aged 3-6 about bodies, and the author has suggested using 'fanny'.

I never referred to DD's bits as a fanny! But I didn't use vulva either... what do you/your dc that age call their bits?!

Penis, vulva, vagina.

Definitely not Fanny.
if a book is about bodies I’d expect it to name
the parts accurately, regardless of age it caters for.

It does name the parts accurately. But there's a section where kids are talking about other names they use.

They get taught the correct names at school so it's easier just to go with those.

Any book that references genitals for 3-6 year olds needs to be biologically accurate.

If a book about bodies isn't biologically accurate, it's inappropriate (for kids!).

At that age, I would have used penis and vagina. While vagina isn’t technically the correct term, it’s a bit more of the socially acceptable term. Now that my dd is older, she would know the more specific and correct terms. As a parent, I definitely wouldn’t buy a book that used the term fanny!

Penis and vagina…please don’t assign them anything else

This is a cartoon section showing kids talking about the names they use. There's no scope to change it, I don't think.

This , if parents want to call it something else then that's Up to them . I seen someone say they called it a fairy I've heard that before fanny here (Ireland) is more of a slang derogatory name for it like if someone wants to be rude.

They say willy but know the proper names.

We call it a willy. We haven't talked about female parts but I'd go for vagina and vulva. I wouldn't stress about insisting they use them entirely accurately. To me, using clear terms is to save confusion and no one is going to ignore a disclosure or not investigate a medical concern just because a child said vagina when they meant vulva or vice versa.

I think the main confusion is that our society is so horrified by vaginas that we don't have one universal slang term for them that everyone understands. And when a term becomes popular enough to be the equivalent to "willy" (like fanny), we then decide that is inappropriate as well.

I think there are maybe regional differences, but to me fanny would be quite crude.

We use vagina.

My husband insist on saying 'tail' which annoys the life out of me. My child isn't a monkey! My son just says penis or sometimes willy.

Girls - I've heard dd call them 'bits' 'girls bits' and when I was a child it was 'tuppence'! Fanny to me isn't child speak but maybe it's a regional thing?

Like everyone else says it's much easier to just call them the proper names but I realise that isn't what you want to know.

Since it’s for the cartoon, I think it’s OK to use other words to acknowledge that not all parents will use the correct anatomical name. There’s probably a degree of colloquialism in the words used. I was brought up with Fanny and front bottom, I’ve heard Tuppence, Mary and Fairy. As well as Willy, I’ve heard Pee Pee, Tail, Tassel, John Thomas, Doody (that one confused me!).

'Willy' is so vile 🤢

Why do we need slang terms, genuinely? You can talk all you like about how there isn't a generally accepted one for vagina like there is for penis, but it's just ridiculous to have to do it anyway. It imbues a disconnect in children that does make them more susceptible to abuse, regardless of the later consequences of being unable to describe that abuse accurately.

Me too 😂 I remember as a child listening to a Lisa Stansfield song that has the lyrics “with hands so warm, you touch my very soul” and mishearing it as “you touch my fairy” and thinking it was very rude 😂

I use anatomical terms - penis, vulva etc.

Don't be daft, if a child says someone hurt their willy or fanny they would be understood. Just like we say tummy, bum, etc.

Vagina isn't the correct term, it's vulva for external parts so you're being incorrect as well as rather prim.

Day to day we use fanny and willy but my kids know the other term as well. They'll encounter other kids using slang terms at school so makes sense to learn them.

I agree that we don't "need" a slang word. I use vagina & vulva with my DDs.

But I do think it's an interesting difference that for penis we have a non-cutesy, non-offensive, pretty universally understood word "willy". And yet for vagina, it's either cutesy or crude.
And I think that even if you're talking about just using the correct word, some people are more negative about using vagina/vulva than they would be about using penis.

Willy/penis and vulva. Maybe sometimes privates too.

Vagina is the correct term given I didn't provide any context. 'Wipe your vulva' is correct, 'your period exits through your vagina' is also correct.

And I didn't say it would cause later confusion, I said you should name them correctly regardless of later consequences. I was dismissing that as the main issue with not naming things properly.

To be fair most 3-6 year olds won't have much of a concept of a vagina.

If it's a book teaching the proper names then having a section on "some families use different names" then fanny would definitely be on that list as it's a fairly common one.
But it should be emphasized what the actual names are and how it's important to know them.

Vulva and penis but as they're now a lot older they also use foofoo and vajayjay and dick and knob ( probably not for a 3-6 year old though)