Embrace the Wonder and Curiosity

On a recent trip to the North Carolina Museum of Natural Sciences with my three boys (9, 12, & 16), I witnessed the power of wonder and curiosity at work. We went down to see the touring Genghis Khan exhibit (which is marvelous by the way).  On the drive down I shared the plan with the boys that we would tour the new exhibit and then check out the rest of the museum followed by lunch.  Their near universal answer was, "oh, we have been to the museum hundreds of times and we have seen it all.  It will be boring..."  So I was now a bit dubious on the prospects for the day.  They all were thoroughly engaged with the Kahn exhibit, even the nine year old was reading the plaques and watching the videos and checking out the mummy (his favorite part).  So we came to the end of the exhibit and it was now time to explore the rest of the museum and the chorus of complaints echoed once more, but we soldiered on.  Within a few steps down the hall, they were hooked once more and now I heard "ooo, look at this", and "Cool! check out the snakes!" The natural curiosity and wonder of the world around us found in our children is one of the great gifts of parenthood.  Stay close to them and look at the world through their eyes and you too can find yourself marveling at the beauty and variety that mother nature has created.  One of things my boys love to do is come up with their own names of the creatures they discover.  I have found that they often do better than those who defined the official commons we all know.  They long-nosed gar was dubbed, the "Pinocchio fish" and the red-bellied woodpecker, has become the "red mohawk woodpecker", because as the boys point out, their really isn't much red on his belly and what is their is actually more orange anyway.  Now don't get me wrong, we need a commonly know set of names for all living things so that we may share or experiences and organize our research, but while your teaching your kids the names of plants and animals, take a moment and as them what they would name it, if they could.  You might be surprised by fun and insightful answers you receive.