Questions

The other night I was at my knitting group and we were all sitting down eating dinner together. Well, one of the girls in the group is 13 and in 8th grade, she is our youngest member, and the other women in my group asked her a very simple, traditional question for a child of that age, "So, how was school?" I seriously stopped what I was doing because I was taken back about 6 years to when I was the age where my parents asked me that question. It has been so long! I started laughing because I didn't expect to feel all nostalgic about a question like this but there you have it.

Ciara, the 13 year old, is special. She likes to talk and so she went on and on about her day but usually when parents ask this question you hear the traditional answer, "Fine." This got me thinking about when I am a parent of a child who's in school. I don't want to hear the traditional answer. I want Dom and I to ask deeper, more interesting questions about their day so that we hear something more than just, "Fine." They don't have to be serious, "How many kids did you catch picking their noses today?" would work but I think that if you want a serious answer than you need to be specific. "How was school?" is so broad. Something more like, "What was the most interesting thing you learned today?" or "Which new math fact interested you the most?" That last one is because I'm a math nerd. I LOVE math but it's been a while so the intimacy has faded a bit. I want them to have a passion for learning and I think by asking them more about the specifics they learned and even allowing them to teach me can aid in that.

So here's to being a creative parent when the time comes and not hearing one word answers. :)