I wrote this in a notebook a year or so ago and with the creation of this blog I thought I would go dig it up and post it.
I was following my nephew as he crawled around the house this evening. I wasn't following to make sure he wouldn't touch anything or get hurt. I was following him to make sure he touched everything and learned.
A door stop to you is just an annoyance when you run your vacuum past it. To a child a door stop is an entertaining noise, found nowhere else in the house, a button to be pushed, a toy that bounces back, like on his bouncy chair.
A portal to another world full of interesting shapes, sounds and colors is just a cupboard to you.
Ants crawling around your garage are a sign to pick up pest control products next time you're at Canadian Tire. Yet a child will watch, poke, squish, divert, dump dirt on them for an hour or more.
Watching him made me see that a child doesn't care what something is, more so how something is. How does it work, how does make noise, how does it move, taste, feel.
Next time you are around a child let them crawl around just just watch. Watch the power of a fresh new mind grow and absorb. Watch their face as they try to work things out in their head.Remember, the mundane things in your life are the newest, most amazing thing to a child.
Every second is a new chance to learn something for a child. Don't stifle that by stopping them in case they might get hurt. Let them get hurt, that's how you learn. Obviously I mean a bump on the head or a slight pinch of the finger, don't let them crawl across the stove or anything like that.
The Wright brothers didn't learn to fly by being tethered to the ground.
A great woman once said "Take chances, make mistakes, get messy."
Let the child fly.