Children’s magazines abound, with an especially large number featuring health and science-related content. Children between the ages of two and fourteen and parents can choose from magazines of general interest, those featuring crafts, coloring pages and cutout pages and others offering history, literature, sports, consumer news, religion, geography and entertainment. Generally these contain sixty pages or fewer, and circulations range from 5,000 to 2.5 million. In the 1990s, these magazines increasingly used clever graphics, color and activities to extend the reading or educational experience for their audience. They also show links to consumerism and reproductions of gender and other divisions.

The most popular titles include the longrunning, general interest Highlights for Children, with a circulation of 2.5 million and a stated mission of “fun with a purpose” for children aged between two and twelve. Boy’s Life, the Boy Scouts of America publication, has a circulation of 1.3 million tied to its institutional framework. National Geographic World, a geography magazine for children between the ages of six and twelve, drawing on the popular adult magazine, has a circulation of 1.2 million.

As Boy’s Life suggests, magazines for children recognize and reproduce gender differences. Girls magazines include American Girl (circulation 700,000), a spin-off of the popular American Girl books and dolls, and New Moon: The Magazine for Girls and their Dreams (circulation 28,000), which encourages pre-teen girls to become confident young women with dreams and positive role models from various ethnic communities.

Teen-oriented Girl’s Life includes traditional features such as pen pals, family advice, horoscopes and reviews of CDs.

Science and nature magazines include: Chickadee (ages three to nine); Kïds Discover and Odyssey, for elementary school students; Owl; Ranger Rick, the National Wildlife Federation publication for elementary students; and 3–2–1 Contact, the flashy and savvy science magazine for children aged eight to twelve, published by the Children’s Television Workshop (CTV also has a preschool magazine, Sesame Street). Most have web-sites that extend children’s experiences beyond the magazine.

The CTV and American Girl connections also suggest synergy in children’s magazines and consumption. This permeates publications like Crayola Kïds, Disney Adventures, a hundred-page, digest-sized publication covering television, sports, music and twenty-five pages of comics, and Nïckelodeon, from the cable network.

Magazines with historical/cultural emphases include Cobblestone, Calliope and the anthropological Faces (for ages nine to fourteen). Meanwhile, Cricket, Spider and Ladybug provide stories, poems and games. Stone Soup provides a forum for writers and artists up to age thirteen. Other specialty magazines, whether Zillions, from consumer reports, or Sports Illustrated for Kïds and Soccer Jr., identify children as junior adults.