Monday, October 01, 2012

The Wonder and Curiosity of Children

The Birth of the Scientific Method
She examined the box empty, and examined it again with all the jacks inside it. She picked up one jack on the palm of her hand, and held it out to me, saying, “Dat?” (Which is her request for information about a thing). I said, “That’s a jack.” “Jahk,” she said. And she said it again, touching various jacks: “Jahk, jahk.” 
As I sat watching her, I realized in a way I hadn’t since my own kids were small that play at this age is entirely purposeful. She was learning everything she could about those objects and how they worked. She was creating and testing hypotheses as fast as her little fingers could try them out.
I love experiencing the curiosity of kids. It is so pure and wonderful. They see the world and want to understand it. You are absolutely right about how deeply this curiosity is within us. Sadly we can still have it stomped out by our lives. It doesn't have to be, but it often is. And I think we miss that wonder, even if we don't know that is what we are missing.

I have written about this topic on my science blog: Growing Curious Children - Naturally Curious Children - Sarah, aged 3, Learns About Soap - Playing Dice and Children’s Numeracy

1 comment:

Unknown said...

I found this link from your comment on Wally Brock's Blog Here http://blog.threestarleadership.com/2012/10/08/banks-and-the-vacuum.aspx?ref=rss

Great Post. I love watching my son learn new things. They are often things I wouldn't take the time to look into but he'll spend an hour or so fooling with it. Recently he taught me about climbing the ladder in life and I thought I'd share it with your readers.

http://jaysonfeltner.com/what-a-one-year-old-taught-me-about-climbing-the-ladder.html