Truly a Masterpiece.(You Are a Masterpiece)

One of my favorite adages (which, in my role as a parent, I hope is not honored more in the breach than in the observance) is Proverbs 22:6. It reads, "Train up a child in the way he should go, and when he is old, he will not depart from it."

Foolproof? Of course not. We all have free will and life will offer my/your kids plenty of competing lessons.

But it's amazing how much sticks. For instance, whenever my wife and I do something that suggests we are not going to make our two younger children adhere to this or that rule as strictly as we required of our two oldest children, boy, do we hear about it!

I mention this as a way of introducing an idea that is hardly new but one that grows in importance, at least for me. And that is the notion of educating about life throughout life, starting early.

Which brings me to You Are a Masterpiece, produced by the Human Development Resource Council (HDRC). Very briefly, those of you with elementary school-age kids could not find a better introduction to the sensitive subject of how babies grow than this state-of-the-art animated video.

The two most obvious potential missteps when formulating a message about prenatal development for children roughly 5-12 years old are (1) detouring off the main highway onto back roads that do not need to be explored with little ones, and (2) failing to make a complicated subject understandable. You Are a Masterpiece does not get sidetracked and uses a vocabulary and illustrations (including in utero photography and 3D animation) that make sense to youngsters.

Produced in association with Small Fry Productions, the video has assembled an impressive list of awards, to say the least. According to the HRDC, You Are A Masterpiece was nominated Best Video of the Year by "Kids First!" a sort of Academy Award for children's video.