Gifted Issues Discussion homepage Forums Parenting and Advocacy Do your kids ask questions like this?!

Do your kids ask you questions often that you don't know the answers to? My son is four and he's starting to do it almost daily now! I feel so, I don't know, not smart?

The latest questions that boggled my mind:

1. Does God, our Heavenly Father have a Father?

2. Does Heavenly Father Have a wife?

THere ha ve been lots I have to look up, but those were two, I had to just tell him what i believe, and what made sence to me, or ask, what do you think.

What kind of questions will he have when he grows up?!

What have your kids asked you?

Yes, we get existential questions too. Not those specifically, but other God questions and things like "what's on the other side of the universe." And when he was 3 and our dog died and I was explaining death, he wanted to know how people would see each other again in heaven if their eyes didn't work after they were dead. (Thanks a lot for that little bit of theology, DH. lol. YOU try explaining souls to a 3-year-old.)

I don't know if this is a GT thing or just a preschooler thing.

You are not alone I feel "dumb" all the time LOL. My DS6 even told me I should take the dumb test on the computer!

What are calories? was a recent question.
of course I hesitated and he said "is it good or bad"
That was really what he wanted to know.
So I said "good" he then says "Oh so pepsi one calorie is not good then"
Eh and I let it go at that. Oh well. Sometimes it is too draining to really explain stuff.

We definitely get questions like that here. One of the more recent questions was "What was Jesus' last name?"

You are definitely not alone in feeling "not smart". I very often will tell my DS5, "Wow, that's a good question, I don't really know." If it's something that we can look up, we do it together on the computer. Of course I'm waiting for the day when he realizes that the number of questions I don't know is greater than the number I do know... :-)

The fact that they are asking as a toddler is suppose to be a link to gifted. The average child usually asks around 7 or 8.

Tonight it was "Is God a Man or a Woman?"
I stumbled around with "we really don't know...usually we refer to God as him...but since God isn't human maybe he's neither a Man or a Woman...or maybe he's both"

That of course didn't suffice, so DD4 changed the question to "Is God a boy's name or a girl's name?"

My children constantly remind me of how little I know. I keep fighting the urge to pretend there are pat answers to these kinds of questions.

My DS torments me with abstract concepts! You try to define Honesty, Loyalty, Respect Etc. We all know what they are but just try to put them into words!

I remember when my DS was a pre-Ker. He asked DH, "Why are we here?" DH was putting DS to bed. DH asked him, "WHy are we in this bed? In this room? In this house?" But it wasn't any of those. He insisted, "No, why are we HERE?"

When he was just over 3 and I had just read him a kid's book on pregnancy and childbirth, DS4 asked me "Where did people come from? How did they get here to earth?" More recently, it was "who invented people?" I also get lots of questions about bodily functions, like "Why do you hiccup?" and "Why do you laugh?" which I can't answer.

We get a lot of these questions, all the time, from our oldest (now 5). It was one of the first things that made me really wonder about him and suspect he was different. I was pregnant with his brother who was born right at his second birthday. During the pregnancy he asked question after question about fetal development, what it was like for his brother in utero, how he was breathing, eating, etc. It was a little bizarre, and now I know that it was also unusual b/c his older brother didn't care a lick about these things when I was pregnant with our youngest (middle brother was also less than 2 at the time). He also asks us lots of tough questions. Things like, "When was I first alive?" I always answer his questions honestly, often times saying things like, "People disagree about the answer to that question, some believe . . . and some believe . . . " Or I say things like, "Well, some people think . . . , but no one really knows." Recently, he got frustrated with the "no one really knows" response and said, "Mom, why are there so many things that no one knows the answer to! I wish we knew the answer to everything!"

AAAAH aren't kids wonderful?! I had such a smile on my face as I read all your comments above. And I love too that you're saying "I don't know" and offering different viewpoints; it really helps your child to try and see things from others' perspectives (something some adults still can't do-!!)

Oh yes! DD5.5 started asking 'why' questions when she was 3 and she makes me feel completely stupid and ignorant...

Some examples: why do birds do not have teeth? why ducks float in the water?

Then she asked a lot about death which I usually gave very vague answers. Despite this at four she already understood that everybody dies of mostly old age, but as well of illness or injury and that this includes herself.

Most of the time she is busy with science questions. She wants to know about photosynthesis, of what is made the sand, the bread, etc.

there are some wonderful books for preKers/Kers. I can't recall the exact title, something like "Answers to those "Why do cheetahs have spots and those other questions kids ask" or something like that. Some of the books have themes like weather, human body, habitats etc.

Today my 3 y.o. asked me if Heaven was on the map he was looking at... We were in Church this morning, so I think the idea was planted, but still!

The questions just get more difficult. Yesterday, my daughter asked if a person would decompose in space. This was related to a Mars visit that would take several generations. I had never thought about it, but is the answer no? There are no natural decomposers in space such as insects, vultures, etc.

cool question! I think decomposition occurs via microbes, too, but I think moisture/temp are factors that determine speed. One I remember from a few years back- why do snakes have forked tongues? I often get these great questions in the car and finally said we have to start writing them down so we dont forget to google them!

Two of my favorite questions from my dd when she was a preschooler:
After finding out I was pregnant, "If I came from your tummy, and you came from your mommy's tummy, and she had a mommy, and her mommy had a mommy, then where did the first mommy come from?"
And another, "Dinosaurs were here before us but now they're extinct, right? So what what will be here after we're gone?"

Lately we get questions about food labels, "what's calcium, what's sodium, what's calories etc" Being skinny I am sure people think I am anorexic reading all the labels because why would he read them. But he does, he is anxiety prone so he is worried about what he is eating now. Anxiety is another issue.

Question of the day....

Mom, who do you suppose picked the colors? Who decided trees should be green and the sky blue?

My ten year old wants to know why we have to pay the price for people who make bad decisions.

All the time. I get the strangest questions, many of which I have no clue. DS4 asks lots of questions about heaven, and what happens after death. "where is heaven?" "is there water for goldfish in heaven?" "who will go to heaven?" And questions about God as well. Also about planets and solar systems...and lots of number questions "so 1 trillion has 16 0's, how many does a gazillion have?" "what is infinity x 2?" "do you ever wonder what the mantle in the earth looks like?" uh no, why would I ever wonder that? LOL When he was 2 he started asking questions like "how does the water get in water towers to come to our house...how does it get up there?" and "how do doorbells ring?" And lots of other questions about how electronics work. It is quite overwhelming. When I don't know (which is often) we will look it up if he interested enough. Also he likes to ask for definitions of abstract words...which is always fun. I never realized how challenging it can be to verbally define certain words. We also have some books of questions. There is a good book I believe it is called "how come?" there is a series of different topics. He finds that fairly interesting.

I love the questions, even though usually my answers involve something like, "Here's what some people believe, and here is what others believe." OR "Let's look that up on the Internet!"

My favorites have been about how animals evolve - DD4 is very interested in paleontology and archaeology, and we've done everything from mock digs in the backyard to reading everything we can get our hands on. Related to this are the countless questions on Human Growth and Development in utero.

DD4 is also interested in the idea of God - her preschool teachers make the kids pray before lunch, and she can't figure this out. "Mom, why do I have to thank someone that's invisible for lunch? You made my lunch, so I decided to thank you instead." And, "My teacher told me God lives in the sky. But I know that clouds are just water vaper, so that can't be true. He'd fall right through!!"

I think we have a budding skeptic on our hands.... :-)

DS6: "Do bees know they're going to die before they sting you?"

All our Pochemuchkas!!!!

Yesterday, my son (after 2 "boring" hours of childrens church) asked me why age is so important. I asked him what he was talking about and he told me that he thought dividing children by age was dumb...he said they should be divided by their intellect. Pretty insightful!

Movingup, how old is he? THAT'S pretty scary. What did you say???

Smiles,
Kate

When I was little and asked my dad (a minister) where heaven was, he said "everywhere." -- in case that helps with these "location of God" questions.

My favorite answers to theology questions from DS5 are "Good question -- nobody really knows the answer" and "Remember to ask Grandpa next time you see him." Not that he accepts those answers, you understand. But they're my favorites. :lol:

I like to say "What do you think?"

Sometimes my kids ask a question because they have an answer in mind and they want to see if they're "right." So I prefer to hear them out first and then discuss with them what they believe, rather than trying to give them any sort of answer.

FWIW...

DS6 at 2 - who's that man? where's he going? why did he choose that car? is that his favourite colour? where does he live? does he have kids? what would their names be? would they have a toy rocket? where does he work? what job does he do? what does he like to eat? etc. Confined space - rapid fire - car torture.

DS6 now - why is there a war in the middle east? why don't other coutries go to was with Zimbabwe to get rid of Robert Mugabe even though they go to war in the middle east? why is Zimbabwe poor and dangerous? why doesn't the Zimbabwean army get rid of Robert Mugabe? why did the electorate change their minds at the last election? why are countries in Africa poor? why do countries go to war? how did England manage to colonise so much of the world even though it is so small? why did they want to? why did they think it was alright to do this? why do world leaders choose beautiful ladies for their wives? why does the leader of the opposition want to be Prime Minister?

I feel so utterly inadequate.

<comforting pat on the back>

So sorry!

I told him that i understood his frustration (he is 6). I really didn't know what else to say (as usual!). -- This morning he asked me what the temperature was in Heaven and if it had seasons. I told him that i didn't know, but i imagined it to be the perfect temperature, which for me would be 72. However, others prefer slightly warmer or cooler. He (thinking above me) said, "oh, i get it, God makes it perfect for each person, but only he knows the real temperature. That's great!"

Oh yes. Constant questions! Yesterday DS5 was pondering who would be the next to die in the family. He also wonders who was the first man. He and his brother 8 were trying to figure out who gave birth to the first man.

I've said since the beginning, the one thing DS has done for me is improve my research skills ten fold. I'm forever looking things up!

does anyone know the answer to Ds4's most recent question.
He's wanting to know how the plastic glowing stars and planets on his ceiling glow....

I had a dream last night that I was at a party with my wife and some other people and and Angel appeared and was touching people, sending them to Heaven. When she got to me, I pulled back and said that I had so much left undone and wanted to wait. She touched me briefly and it was sparkly hot like a 9 volt battery on your tongue. She said she would come back for me in five years and went on to other people. (My DW chose to go, but she was in another part of the party..sigh. )

Does that answer the question? Sparkly hot??

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Luminescence

I know a girl who has put all the constellations on her ceiling with luminescent paint.

OT:- This reminds me of the childhood room of Randy Pausch, author of the The Last Lecture.

I teach children's church - it is very boring for my child as well. I just hit our pastor with a recommendation that age not be the only factor in determining which child attends which class - my son (starting at age 9) skips children's church and goes to "regular" church so "he can learn something" (his words). Your son is onto something - I think if a pastor really understands this, he/she would be all for helping him dig deeper into the topics, issues, and lessons.

DS5 has always asked stuff like this! I'm SO thankful that I had c-sections with both my children because I'm not sure how I would be able to explain childbirth to a 3yr old!

What a great set of answers. Surely you are modeling how to be thoughtful and comfortable with grey areas and the mysteries of the universe.

I can always tell when my DD6 has had a day at school where she didn't get interested in things becasue she asks all sorts of "tough" questions on the ride home. A few months ago she told me she had a really really tough question for me and she didn't think I'd know the answer, but she'd let me have a shot at it anyways (nice to be told your dumb by a kindergartener): "If God made everything and everyone, who made God?" My response was that we didn't really know but that she should ask her Sunday school teachers maybe they would know. She then quickly followed that one with "Ok Mommy, now I have have a super tough one, even harder than the first one." (How can it get harder than this? was my thought). SHe then asked "What started the big explosion that started the universe? If there was nothing before the big bang, what could have started it, because things can't just explode for no reason." I sent her to her dad for the answer to that one, he's a astrophysicist.

I agree with BWBShari my research skills have improved a ton lately.

yep, research skills have greatly improved here too. When DD was 3 she would ask so many questions about gravity. She wanted to know all the details of how it worked, why it worked, what would happen if it didn't work. Wouldn't it be fun if it didn't work just a little? At 4 she asked me what the first state of the union was? Back to the computer, it is Delaware, then she wanted to know what order the states came into the union. Printed it out, then she would read it over and over until she had it memorized. When she started Kindergarten (she goes to a private school) they are learning stories from the Bible in the new testament, I watch her one night memorize of the books of the new testament, it was the most amazing thing. Anyway this one keeps me on my toes and on my computer looking up stuff.

This one stumped me yesterday..

We were at the pediatric optalmology dr's office for DD4's first official eye check up. They showed her pictures on a screen to identify; teddy bear, boat, christmas tree etc. When that was done, she asks the Dr.. Were you showing the pictures to test my eyes? Like the eye chart? Were you showing pictures instead of letters because you thought maybe I was a baby? I am now a kid you know and can read. We were stumped! I wondered where she had seen an eye chart before and can only imagine that it must have been at her cousin's playing with a Doctor toy set.

Dh brought home a bunch of croissants from Costco. Ds(3) interrupted me while I was on the phone because he had an emergency: he needed to know "which company made the croissants?"

(You should have heard the reaction from the person on the other end of the phone.)

That one made me laugh, Ds4 is always doing that! For some reason he's interested in brand names and stuff. He also constantyly had those kinds of "emergencies" and is constantly inturrupting. At 3 years we told him he needed to say excuse me to be polite, when he wanted to inturruped to tell people things or inturrupt. I wonder if that was a mistake, because excuse me is like his most over used word. He always has something to say, or ask. Drives us a little crazy.

don't remember the exact question

Kid @5 Will the days go on forever?

like, at 5 or 6
"dad, if you were travelling at the speed of light, would you see your shadow?"

Or, "if a cardboard box got too close to the sun would it catch fire, since there is no oxygen in space?"

Or "which is heavier, my Action Man model or the sun ?" (A question about mass)

It goes on and on - I ask him questions now :-)

DS4 (last night at bedtime - when all the questions seem to appear) "where did the first person on earth come from?" I could deal with that one.

Today I had "who dresses up as the Easter Bunny?" DH and I just sat there grinning, we didn't know what to say. I don't like lying to them because they trust us so much and it is such a fine line! I still remember when my older DS (who was then 5) asked me if we pretended to be the tooth fairy, but then he said "that would be ridiculous because why would you pay me money for my old teeth - what would you do with them?"

Now the big question that DH and I try to avoid answering - "how does the sperm get to the egg?" It is hard to know how much detail they can handle at such a young age.

Yes, questions are relentless in our house!

FWIW...

My usual approach to those tricky sex questions is to give them short answers containing any info they specifically ask for--using the clinical terms for body parts, nothing cutesy or incorrect--but no more. If they keep asking, I keep answering. But the second they stop asking, I stop talking.

For a 4yo, I'd probably respond that a Mommy and Daddy have a special hug they use to make a baby. If he pressed on, I'd explain interc0urse in the simplest terms: pen1s meets vag1na, and that it's something only people old enough to handle a baby should do. (Values teaching, too...) Nothing more.

That was the response that satisfied my kids and wasn't too much detail for them to handle. And I think it's good that they will know that they can't get a girl pregnant by kissing her or any of those things that so many kids think.

Oh yeah my DS(5) is working on the concept of infinity. I get questions like
"When is the end of all the days?"
"What is the biggest number of all the numbers?"

But my favorites are
"How does the brain know what the eye sees?" @4
& recently "What is water made of?" Which led to a discussion of the elements.

Wow is his Kindergarten teacher in for a surprise!

DS5 wants to learn more about elements after seeing a zula patrol show about them. He has been asking things like "what do you get if you have 2 oxygens and one hydrogen, instead of H2O, or 6 hydrogens and a carbon?" I will have to defer to DH and get some more resources!

DS5 also wanted to know if his eyelids would grow along with the rest of him. He doesn't want them to grow - he thinks they would get in the way of his eyes.

Thanks Kriston - I like your approach!

The big question tonight from DD6 was "if the earth moved faster, would time pass by faster" My response was, I think we're going to have to look that one up. Her response was "We need to find out soon, I really need to know"

Oh Skylersmommy - I love that one! We are constantly having to look things up in this house.

Didn't Superman do that? I think he spun the earth backwards to reverse time.

Hilarious! I wish I had thought up some of these responses.

My DS16 has had the existence question on and off throughout the years. He started with the "Why am I here?" when he was around 7 and then when he was 13, he became extremely upset one day and wanted to know "Why do I exist?" He didn't find much humor when I told him to "Who else would fill my life and drive me crazy occasionally" and he insisted on a proper answer. We began exploring different religons and beliefs for this one so he could draw his own conclusion. It seemed as though he could not understand it was a question many philosophers still hold.

Another time, he asked his 1st grade teacher "Do we have seeds inside us?" after they were exploring the parts of a plant. His teacher insisted that I have the "talk" with him. I quickly explained he already knew and he was just testing you. :p

As far as how brain knows what the eye sees, there is a FANTASTIC show addressing this. There is a blind man with no eyes from birth, but he is a wonderful painter and paints w/ perspective and proportion. Scientists have been studying him since we originally thought you see with your eyes. I'll see if I can find the link to the program.

I found it! Here's the ink. The Blind Artist

LOL--I was thinking more like E=mc2 and was going to explain the difference between theory and fact, but I like your thoughts on the matter.

by the way do you remember which Superman movie had that in it? Although because it doesn't have a princess, fairy, or a cute animal in it I don't know if it would hold her attention

When dd was 3.5, my grandmother died after a lengthy illness. While we did not live nearby, she and dd had spent several holidays together over the years, and with an upcoming memorial service, I knew I had to explain to her what had happened.

I sat dd down before bedtime and gave her the talk about great-grandma going to heaven, etc. etc. She looked at me with great intensity through the whole speech.

When I finished, I asked her, "Do you have any questions for Mommy?"

"Yes," DD replied, seriously.

"Go ahead," I said, "You can ask me anything."

"Mommy," she said thoughtfully, "Why do some plants grow in water?"

They're always full of questions. Just sometimes not the ones you are expecting.

I think DS9 was about 8 when he wanted to know if the world population kept growing, would the planet weigh more...

NO I don't. It was the one where Lois Lane is killed in a car and Superman is so distraught, he spins the Earth around to reverse time and save her.

This isn't as tough to deal with as you think - at age 3, my DD wanted to know how babies were made. We talked about sperm and egg, and how they join to make a special, unique person. She was really interested to know that no sperm or egg are exactly alike, which is why every person in the world is different. This satisfied her for awhile, until one day (shortly after she turned 4) she asked, "How do the sperm get to the egg inside the mommy?" So I talked about how boys and girls are different (she already knew the names for penis and vagina) and talked about how a grown-up man puts his penis into the grown-up woman's vagina and sperm comes out to find the egg. If they find each other, they make a baby that grows in the uterus. When the baby is born, it comes out through the vagina.

DD4 was FASCINATED by all of this, and consequently understands the concept and the correct information. I don't think it's bad to explain all of this to your child if they are asking - if they sense your discomfort, they will mistakenly believe that it's embarrassing or inappropriate to discuss. However, I do think the discussion needs to be child-directed - my youngest (almost 4) has never asked and I've never brought it up. But I do think it's important to start that dialogue as soon as the questions start - hopefully DD4 won't be embarrassed to discuss it if it's been an ongoing discussion since a young age. As a middle school teacher with 3 pregnant 13-year-olds in my class, I can say that I wish those girls' mothers had had an ongoing dialog with them.

As for giving her the information and worrying that now she'll be curious and want to try it someday, she's informed me that making babies doesn't sound like much fun (she doesn't like boys at this point!) and she has no desire to ever have children! In fact, the other night at dinner DH and I were discussing how these young girls were having babies, and DD4 piped up with, "Mom, that doesn't make sense - how do they get the sperm without a husband?" This opened up a dialog about our value system, which turned into great dinner table conversation. I am hoping this sort of thing sets the stage for ALL ideas to be discussed openly, into middle school and beyond.

During our Human Growth and Development Unit (I'm a science teacher) a couple of the pregnant girls in my class said they wished someone had explained it all to them six months ago. My class was the first time they'd heard the specifics about birth control. *sigh*

Kids need the right information, and they need it from their PARENTS. Part of the reason I'm so adamant about this is that, when I was 5, the older brother of a neighbor friend told us that girls get pregnant when the boy pees inside the girl. I spent the next couple of years being afraid to use the bathroom after my brother did, and when I finally got enough guts to ask my mother, she gave me some uncomfortable answer about how babies are made when a man and woman love each other very much - which made me picture some sort of existential occurance that I didn't understand. On some level, I knew she was sugar-coating it, and I didn't understand why she wouldn't answer my questions. I finally learned the truth in junior high from friends (sort of). I was ready to know at a young age - I was intellectually capable of handling it, and knowing would have satisfied my curiosity. I never was able to have a frank discussion with my mother about sex, even as an adult. I want my kids to feel safe asking me anything!

I'm so glad to hear other kids are asking questions that you can't answer. I think that DS was 2 or just barely 3 when he told me that Santa Clause was impossible. He said that there was no way he could get into our house or the house of all other kids in the world. My step kids (4 and 6) still really believe in Santa and stuff my my son treats it all like a joke.

The other day he asked me what was here before we were. I have pondered that many times but how do you explain that to a 4 year old?

Thanks Jen74, that is a very interesting point that you have made. We already use all the scientific names for body parts in our house and I guess this is just taking it one step further. I am always just worried about what they might say to their friends - I don't want lots of irate parents approaching me !

Tiz,

Strangely enough, my daughter has never (to my knowledge) brought it up to any of her friends. It would be akin to discussing why they all have fingers. I think she thinks every kid knows that! :-)

Same here. From what I've seen, it's just not something they think too much about...until puberty, of course!

MON - I agree with you on MANY levels. However, I currently teach in a Title I school with 90% poverty and mostly minority kids. I can say almost unequivocally that the parents of my students ARE NOT talking to them about sex - either the emotional or scientific aspects. We teach what's called an "Abstinence Plus" curriculum, which emphasizes abstinence but teaches about birth control and STDs. We talk a lot about the emotional aspects of sex as well. The feedback I usually get from the kids is gratitude that someone has explained this stuff, and I can say with certainty that I definitely have their attention more than any other time in the school year. They want and need to know this stuff, but none of their parents discuss it.

So I think in some cases, the schools need to do what the parents won't for the good of society.

I think it is so sad that the parents don't talk to their children about this issue. My guess is that if they don't talk to them about this, they may not talk to them about other important issues too. Although I see the need here , one of the main reasons my children will not go to public school (I'm not sure what a title 1 school is) is because I do not want strangers to inform them about sex, that's mine and my husbands job. But, the bottom line here is that I am informing them, answering all their questions, teaching them the moral issues, values, and everything that goes with it. I wish everyone that had children would be a parent as well. Jen74 I know your job is hard and my heart goes out to you.

We've just recently bought our DS5 a molecule-building kit - the basic structures Orbit one, but options will be different where you are - and it's a HUGE hit. You also need a periodic table of course - we have one on a mug and one on DS's sweatshirt :-)

What I want next is a really good chemistry DVD for him. I bought the High School Chemistry one from the Learning Company, but we were both thoroughly put off by it spending the first half hour attacking the assumption that we thought chemistry was difficult and boring - which of course we didn't...

Does he mean before humans were on Earth, or before your family in particular? We've had lots of discussions along those lines, and as DD (now 6) gets older she returns to the same question again and again, but wanting more and more for an answer. So, we keep giving more and more ideas and thoughts and let her make the decision about what parts she wants to keep in her brain as the "real answer" for the time being.