One Oakland-based company wants children to know their proximal phalanges from their metatarsals, all while having some fun in the process.

Know Yourself is an Oakland creative media company specializing in educational products that target a plethora of subjects, including anatomy, physiology and psychology, for children of all ages.

The company offers its own brand of self-literacy, defined as having a working knowledge of one’s body and mind, and finds itself standing at the crossroads of art, education and adventure.

“We use a fingerprint in our logo because the fingerprint is something that is similar in all of us, and unique in all of us,” Nancy Howes, founder and CEO of Know Yourself, said in an interview.

“The fingerprint iconically represents everyone’s unique mark on this world,” she said.

Howes said the main goal of Know Yourself is to get children to know their bodies both inside and out, while engaging them through art, adventure and compelling storytelling that builds self-esteem and self-awareness.

“We have a unique situation around the algorithmic and linear way we reach kids and grade them,” Howes said.

“There are some standards that may not fit everyone. There’s diversity in human intelligence, in the way we learn, and in the way we know things,” she said.

The team at Know Yourself consists of a long list of educators, artists, health professionals, parents, and even an in-house comics director.

Although the company officially launched in November, Howes said its inception actually began seven years ago.

“I started this idea when I worked in Silicon Valley, but all the artists I wanted to work with were in Oakland,” Howes said.

“We feel very connected here to Oakland,” she added.

Oakland continues to lend itself as the backdrop in a 12-part self-literacy adventure series titled “The Anatomy Adventure Series,” with the newest edition set to launch in July.

The monthly series follows a group of fictional children called “The Loops Crew” during an animated and educational adventure through time as they learn about different systems of the body.

On one adventure, the Loops Crew is desperate to have a skate park in their community and must go before Oakland City Hall to propose their ideas.

The skate park included in the adventure is actually Town Park, Oakland’s first official skate park located in the heart of Oak Center.

The park was founded by Keith “K-Dub” Williams, who also serves as Know Yourself’s community and education ambassador.

“It’s much more than a skate park,” said Williams. “It’s an actual colorful space here in West Oakland. It’s not a place that we just invented to write a story about that doesn’t really exist. This place actually exists.”

Williams, who also makes an appearance in the comics, said skate culture is woven throughout the adventure series and helps bridge the gap between the educational aspect of Know Yourself and engaging young people through creative outlets that they connect with.

In less than a year, the company has produced three workbooks, “Dr. Bonyfide Presents: Bones of the Hand, Arm, and Shoulder Book 1,” “Dr. Bonyfide Presents: Bones of the Foot, Leg, and Pelvis Book 2” and “Dr. Bonyfide Presents: Bones of the Rib Cage and Spine Book 3.”

The workbook includes educational tools such as memory cues, puzzles, fun facts, quizzes, original comic strips and hands-on activities.

Diligent learners receive a certificate of completion at the back of every workbook.

Products such as T-shirts and hoodies allow learners big and small to wear their bones inside out with skeletal diagrams of the rib cage, spine and skull displayed in the company’s signature artistic style.

“Our adventure guide is filled with STEM activities for science, technology, engineering and math,” Joanne da Luz, director of education and product development, said in an interview.

“But it should be called STEAM because there is also artwork that is incorporated into this. We have amazing artists on our staff,” she said.

Know Yourself recently won the Nautilus Award and two Tillywig Awards, and was nominated for an Oakland Indie Award.

The Nautilus Award was won in the category of children’s illustrated nonfiction for its first book, “Dr. Bonyfide Presents: Bones of the Hand, Arm, and Shoulder.”

The company received the Tillywig Brain Child Award for both categories of toys and games, and books and magazines for its “The Anatomy Adventure Series.”

“One of my main roles is to develop focus groups so that we can better inform the product design going forward,” da Luz said.

“We’re refining the focus group process right now. We’re going to be able to really use some human-centered design approach with kids on-site,” she said.

Local organizations such as the Girl Scouts of Northern California and the East Oakland Youth and Development Center have already been on board to test out Know Yourself’s materials, with more local organizations and companies, summer camps, and after school programs to follow.

“It not only helps us to find glitches in the product but totally enhances it and then it is informed by kids who are actually in the moment while we’re observing,” da Luz said.

“Any activity they want to pursue, they can pursue,” she said.

For more information about Know Yourself, go to www.knowyourself.com.