Neuroscience For Kids

books, articles, audio for high school students

Dana Foundation Publication Archive

Fires of Pain - Burn Pain and Its Treatment
Manhattan Project of the Mind - An article focusing on brain imaging research.
Dr. William H. Calvin - a professor at the Univ. of Washington has many chapters from his books and magazine articles about the nervous system here on his site, for example, The Cerebral Code, Conversations with Neil's Brain, The Emergence of Intelligence, How Brains Think: Evolving Intelligence, Then and Now, The Ascent of Mind, The Cerebral Symphony and The Throwing Madonna

Why Files

Overviews of the Nervous System

Faith Hickman Brynie, 101 Questions Your Brain Has Asked Itself But Couldn't Answer Until Now, Millbrook Press, Brookfield, 1998, 176 pages.
Rita Carter, Mapping the Mind, University of California Press, Berkeley, 1998, 224 pages.
Roberta Conlan (editor), States of Mind: New Discoveries About How Our Brains Make Us Who We Are, New York, Dana Press, 1999, 214 pages.
Joel Davis, Mapping the Mind. The Secrets of the Human Brain and How It Works, Birch Lane Press, Secaucus, 1997, 289 pages.
Stanislas Dehaene, The Number Sense. How the Mind Creates Mathematics, Oxford University Press, 1997, 274 pages.
Marian C. Diamond, Arnold B. Scheibel, Lawrence M. Elson, The Human Brain Coloring Book, Barnes and Noble Books, New York, 1985, 301 pages.
Susan A. Greenfield, The Human Brain, BasicBooks, New York, 1997, 160 pages.
Susan A. Greenfield, The Human Mind Explained, Henry Holt and Co., New York, 1996, 192 pages. An EXCELLENT guide to the brain with plenty of pictures.
Robert D. Griffin, The Biology Coloring Book, Harper Collins, New York, 1986, 256 pages.
Wynn Kapit and Lawrence M. Elson, The Anatomy Coloring Book, Harper Collins, New York, 1993, 352 pages.
Harold L. Klawans, Why Michael Couldn't Hit, and Other Tales of the Neurology of Sports, W.H. Freeman, New York, 1996, 308 pages.
Kenneth A. Klivington, The Science of the Mind, MIT Press, Cambridge, 1989, 239 pages.
Ronald Kotulak, Inside the Brain, Andrews and McMeel, Kansas City, 1996.
Elaine N. Marieb, The A&P Coloring Workbook, A Complete Study Guide, 3rd edition, Benjamin/Cummings.
John McCrone, The Ape That Spoke. Language and the Evolution of the Human Mind, William Morrow and Company, New York, 1991, 288 pages.
D. Michael McKeough, Coloring Review of Neuroscience, 2nd edition, Little, Brain and Co., 1995.
Paul Nordstrom August, The Encyclopedia of Psychoactive Drugs, Series 2, Brain Function, Chelsea House Publ., New York, 1988, 123 pages.
Tabitha M. Powledge, Your Brain: How You Got It and How it Works, Charles Scribner's Sons, New York, 1994, 210 pages.
J. Lawrence Pool, Nature's Masterpiece. The Brain and How it Works, Walker and Co., New York, 1987, 144 pages.
Brain Briefings - A great resource with short discussion of topics including Epilepsy and GABA, The Roots of ALS, Alzheimer's Abnormalities, The Retinoblastoma Gene, Birth Defects, Multiple Sclerosis, The Prefrontal Cortex and Schizophrenia, Huntington's Disease Genetics, Parkinson's and Dopamine, The Senses, Sleep, Brain Imaging, Development, Brain Mechanisms (Serotonin and Judgment, The Brain's Stash, Cell Suicide, Oxidative Stress and Brain Disorders, The Opiate Receptor, Neurotrophic Factors, NMDA Receptor Blockers, Biological Clocks)
Brain Facts. A Primer on the Brain and Nervous System, Society for Neuroscience, Washington, D.C., 2012
V. S. Ramachandran and Sandra Blakeslee, Phantoms in the Brain : Probing the Mysteries of the Human Mind, William Morrow and Company, New York, 1998, 320 pages.
Jean Stine and Camden Benares, It's All in Your Head, Prentice Hall, New York, 1994, 248 pages.
Time/Life Books, How Things Work - The Brain, Time/Life Books, Alexandria, 1990.
Carol Turkington, The Brain Encyclopedia, Facts on File, Inc., New York, 1995, 316 pages.

Specific Areas of the Nervous System

John Downer, Supersense. Perception in the Animal World, Holt and Co., New York, 1988, 160 pages.
Jillyn Smith, Senses & Sensibilities, John Wiley & Sons, New York, 1989, 230 pages.
William H. Calvin and George A. Ojemann, Conversations with Neil's Brain: The Neural Nature of Thought and Language, Addison-Wesley Publishing Co., New York, 1995, 352 pages.
William H. Calvin and George A. Ojemann, Inside the Brain, New American Library, New York, 1980, 226 pages.
Richard K. Cooley and C.H. Vanderwolf, The Sheep Brain; A basic guide, A.J. Kirby, Co., London, Ontario, Canada, 1979, 34 pages.
Stephen J. DeArmond, Madeline M. Fusco and Maynard M. Dewey, Structure of the Human Brain. A Photographic Atlas, Oxford University Press, New York, 1976, 186 pages.
Eric R. Kandel, James H. Schwartz and Thomas M. Jessel, Principles of Neural Science, Elsevier, New York, 1991, 1135 pages. (This textbook is a comprehensive overview of the whole field of neuroscience and is used in many university graduate and undergraduate courses)
M.B. Macmillan, A wonderful journey through skull and brains: the travels of Mr. Gage's tamping iron, Brain and Cognition, vol. 5, pp. 67-107, 1986. (History and analysis of the brain injury sustained by Mr. Phineas Gage)
Carl Sagan, The Dragons of Eden, Ballantine Books, New York, 1977, 271 pages.

Neuroscience Videos for Students and Teachers

Decade of the Brain Tapes
Films for the Humanities & Sciences - several videos about the senses and brain, but they tend to be expensive.

For more on-line and off-line books and magazine articles, see the Middle School Books Page and the Elementary School Books Page.