Prompt: What does it mean to be a kid at heart?

While raising my children and during my teaching career and now watching my grandchildren, what impresses me most about kids is their curiosity. They are eager to observe and to tinker and figure things out. They are willing to try new things. The world is their laboratory.

They employ their senses in their explorations. For the youngest ones, that means everything goes into their mouths. What does it taste like? How does it feel against my tongue? If I shake it, will it make a noise?

When my littlest granddaughter, Lily, was just one year old, she liked to play in front of a mirror. She watched carefully what happened in the reflection when she placed her ball nearer to the mirror or farther away, to the left or to the right.

When I taught, two days a week I had “morning duty.” That meant I supervised children on the playground before school started for the day. I watched as they invented games and then invited others to join them in play. I watched as they went all out running from one end of the playground to the other. I watched as they collected leaves and rocks and feathers and other treasures.

Some adults (and I confess, I am one of them) lose their sense of wonder as they age. They forget what it’s like to see everything with fresh eyes. They forget how to have fun. They forget to ponder “what if.”

And there are others who haven’t lost their childlike curiosity. They still know how to play and to laugh at absurdities. They’re the ones who are fun to be around. Even children like them.