We could say that genes are small pieces of biological information, passed from parents to their children, encoded in the DNA. Think of genes as a recipe with instructions that list ingredients, amounts, and steps for how to make food. In this example, you are the food, and your DNA is both the paper and the letters used to write the recipe. Although our genes are like recipes, keep in mind that it is a very difficult recipe, with many (many!) ingredients and steps that we are still trying to discover and understand. Now, there are many types of food in the world, just like there are many types of people. Cupcakes are different from cookies because their recipes are different. People are different from each other because of differences in their genes (recipes). Some people are more similar than others (for instance, you and your brother or sister look more alike than you and your friends). This would be like cupcakes and muffins—they are not the same, but they are pretty similar. This is because their recipes are alike but not exactly the same.

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