What They Believe

In the years that I studied psychology and / or education, I learned that just because children don't ask questions doesn't mean they understand a subject. If you withhold information, they will simply make something up so that it will all make sense in their heads.

For example, when I was a little girl, we drove into New York every day from our home in New Jersey, because NY was where I went to school. We took the George Washington Bridge, and there was a toll which, at the time, was a dollar. I asked my mother why we had to pay the toll, and she told me that, if we didn't pay the toll, the bridge would fall down.

What she meant, of course, was that the money collected at the toll went to repair and fix up the bridge so that it would remain standing.

What I understood was that, if you were to step on the gas at the tollbooth instead of paying, the bridge would collapse as you crossed over it to prevent you from getting to the other side, bringing down countless other commuters with you in the process. I spent a lot of time worrying that someone else would try to not pay the toll and the bridge would crumble beneath us as we crossed, or maybe as we sat in the endless traffic, innocent victims. We would plummet into the Hudson River, which was dangerous, dirty, and full of giant octopus-type monsters. I knew this because, even though we could swim, my parents had both told us we couldn't swim in the Hudson, because there was stuff in it.


Another example of kids filling in information: In the car yesterday, Nick asked if people could eat cactus. (Because sometimes, just sometimes, kids will ask you questions like that from out of nowhere. And as the mom, I know everything.)

"Duh! Yes!" said Nate, who was obviously more than a little irritated at the simplicity of the question. "Because people drink water, right? And where does water come from? Cactuses."

Nate (and Nick) central Park, April 2013

Really. I have no idea where he got that.