35 ‘Today I Learned’ Facts That Show It’s Never Too Late To Learn (New Pics)

"Kids asking 'why?' is an important part of their natural curiosity. That said, the constant chatter and questions can grow tedious. I am very open with my kids, and answer just about any question they bring to me. But sometimes I tell them, not right now. I need quiet. And they rarely grant me that quiet. But still, I ask," parenting blogger Samantha was very open with Bored Panda about how she tackles her kids' non-stop curiosity.

Children constantly asking you questions about how the world works and why things are as they are is an ongoing situation that many of you Pandas who have families might be familiar with. The important thing is not to stifle your children's curiosity while giving parents enough time to recharge mentally.

Samantha noted that one of the best things that parents can do is to create a safe space for kids to develop their own skills and talents without the fear of being judged. "And to avoid the temptation to push them down a certain path just because it's familiar and more comfortable for us," she added that we have to do our best to avoid forcing our kids to enjoy certain interests just because we're fans of them.

I was interested to understand whether children naturally pick up some of the same interests and talents as their parents growing up. Samantha was happy to elaborate on what things are like in her family.

"The genes are strong in my family. My husband and I are both writers, and my kids are both artsy types. My son, 10, is a little actor and singer who even appeared on Kids Say the Darndest Things this year. My 6-year-old daughter amazes me with her drawing ability," she said.

"Although my kids' talents are not identical to my husband and me, they are likewise little creative powerhouses. We as parents have made them feel safe and comfortable being themselves and expressing their skills. Then there are some abilities that clearly pass on directly from the parents. For example, my son and daughter are both math whizzes like my husband, while math has always been my nemesis."

The way that we learn things has changed dramatically over the decades and centuries. Lenore Skenazy, the founder and president of the Let Grow nonprofit that promotes childhood independence, and the founder of the Free-Range Kids movement, explained to me earlier that for much of history most people didn’t learn about the world at schools growing up, as they do now.

“In the United States, for instance, school only became compulsory a little over 100 years ago. Previously—for hundreds of thousands of years of human history—kids learned simply by watching, copying, helping, and playing. In other words, they’d hang around the adults, see how they made things like baskets and arrowheads, they’d ask questions, noodle around, and try to copy what their elders were doing,” she told Bored Panda.

“They’d also help out as soon as they could—fetching things, tracking animals, whatever—and in between they’d be playing with a group of mixed-age kids. All these activities were fueled by curiosity,” Lenore went into detail about how kids would learn about the world and life by experiencing everything first-hand and giving their family and community members a helping hand.

“You were motivated to learn what the bigger kids in your group knew, too, because they were so cool. Your entire day consisted of observing and practicing the stuff you needed to know— skills and games. If you weren’t curious, you weren’t going to enjoy life, or succeed at it,” the childhood independence expert said.

“One reason kids might seem less curious today is because most of their education, inside and outside of school, doesn’t require self-motivation, it requires compliance. The drive is extrinsic, not intrinsic. Kids fill out worksheets because they have to, not because these seem interesting, or have any immediate connection to the ‘real’ world,” she said that the trend has reached extracurricular activities as well, unfortunately.

“Learning soccer means doing the drills the coach assigns, as opposed to tagging along with the older kids and working hard to get good enough so that they’d start letting you play. The key to curiosity, then, is giving kids enough free, unstructured time for them to find something they love to do for its own sake—not for a grade, or coach.”

Lenore’s advice? We should let our kids explore their curiosity for the sake of it, not because they were told to do so in a formal setting. “Not every interest has to lead to formal instruction, or at least not until a child really wants it. There’s a big difference between running for a coach, and running for plain old fun. Curiosity and self-direction go hand in hand.”