Explaining darwinism and the world to a 4 year old.

[nevergoogledragonbutter]

DH and DS1 at some point yesterday had a discussion about monkeys and people.

This morning at breakfast he asked, 'why are some people still monkeys and why do other people keep them in zoos?'

Help me out mumsnet. I'm not sure i understand it myself. But how do i explain it to a four year old.

While we're at it, does anyone know if bees get cross that we take their honey? I've explained that they are not cross at the time because of the smoke, but he wants to know if bees hold a grudge.

Help me, i'm not cut out for this.

The bee question can easily be answered by sitting him down in front of "Bee Movie".

yes, the bee movie was good. might rent it again.

i'm beginning to think i might just give him jam.

Thanks for all your replies.
I'm feeling a bit more ready to discuss it with him.
Of course, he'll have moved onto something else by then and I'll be back here asking about bending time.

You could draw a simple evolutionaty tree - monkeys and apes (and other modern-day primates) have a common ancestor somewhere down the trunk. Branch the tree into a monkeys branch and an apes branch, then put twigs on the apes branch for chimps, gorillas, humans etc.

The important thing is that modern day monkeys an apes have evolved (from our common ancestor) just as much as humans have, but into different environmental niches.

We happened to get the nigger brains & increased our ability to adapt to our environment (and importantly adapt our environment to suit us). We learnt to use fire etc, which enabled us to deal with or manipulate many of the constraints monkeys and other apes have on their day to day survival.

HTH

Flipping eck shocking typos sticky keyboard: should be:

evolutionary tree,

monkeys and apes,

BIGGER brains

Thanks, that devolve me thing is great....luckily my ds is mainly interested in car makes and how fast things can go.....when he is not unscrewing the radiator valves off!