loving art, science and creative kids

Curious Cat Emerging

by Marilynne

In looking through my childhood scrapbook there is a photo of me at the age of eight with a large bandage over my nose. Apparently I had been looking over a log at a few chipmunks when I fell forward head first and landed on my nose.....an instance when curiosity got the best of me. Not being stopped by my nosey doings, I continued my quest to understand the natural world. Another time when I was eleven I wondered if the sun was hot enough to cook an egg. On a hot July day I was determined to find out. I cracked an egg in a frying pan and placed the pot on the front porch. It took many hours with bugs flying about but sure enough the egg fried from the top down. It wasn’t so appetizing but our dog certainly had a satisfying treat that afternoon. No parent helped me, or told me what to do. I just did it.

A friend tells the tale of trying to make gunpowder from a variety of household chemicals. He and his buddy waited until his comrade’s parents were away for the afternoon. The two young scientists made a bottle bomb and set it off in the back yard. Ba Da Boom! Their experiment worked, leaving a large crater in the yard and thankfully all 40 toes and fingers accounted for. His parents were not  pleased.

Yes, childhood curiosity can be dangerous and I am not recommending letting kids make bottle bombs, but experimenting without an adult supervisor is an important part of childhood. I am concerned that today's parents are so concerned about safety that they are killing curiosity. Their fears, absorbed from reading news articles sensationalizing horror stories, are so paralyzing that instead of giving their children freedom to explore parents sign them up for structured classes and activities. The statistical chances of someone being kidnapped or a child hurt or lost while walking in the neighborhood are extremely low. It is more likely that a drive to the grocery store will cause an injury. Even so….my observation is that parents worry excessively.

Constant entertainment with busy schedules arranged by parents can stunt the desire of the child to become self-directed. Learning to deal with boredom and laziness is not always a bad thing. It takes quiet time to become an observer of nature and it takes alone time to understand  yourself. At the age of seven while walking a mile (yes walking) alone to school I observed many large worms on the sidewalk. I spit on a worm and discovered that it split in two. The two parts then wiggled off in opposite directions. Since children today are either bused or walked briskly to school accompanied by an adult, they have limited chance to “see” their environment.

Peter Gray, a research professor at Boston College, wrote in Psychology Today about what we can learn from Hunter Gatherers. Those primitive people believed in values of personal autonomy and equality. They thought it wrong to try to control another person’s life, even a child’s. The way they taught children was by providing them with ample time to play, explore and learn by trial and error. Only when the child was motivated would the adult teach by demonstrating and presenting information. At that point small versions of tools that were in common use were given so the child could practice. Children were commonly invited to observe adult activities and their interruptions were tolerated. Games were played by both children and adults to foster a sense of community sharing.