All children's names have been changed.
Example by Hanna Vock, Bonn
Felizitas (name changed) (7;0) explains to her family at the dinner table: “I want to live forever.” Her little sister Elizabeth replies: “But then we are all going to die and you're going to be all alone here in the apartment.”
Here an early ability to conceive of the future is displayed.
See also : Mental Faculties .
Elisabeth at the age of 3;3, having seen the “Sandmännchen” [sandman] on TV, asks about the ‚sandman': „Mom, how does the dreamsand get through the screen of the TV-set?“ [In the German TV version of the sandman he will at the end of each sequel throw dreamsand towards the viewers in order to make them sleepy.]
Elisabeth, at the age of 3;10, witnesses her mother play Santa Claus at a Christmas festivity at a local neighbourhood association. Afterwards she tells her mother that she had still recognized her inspite of the (altered) voice and asks whether on Christmas Eve
the real Santa would come to their house or whether it would only be a fake Santa, like that day.
Example from a family, anonymous
Kilian, 6, was working with my typewriter. He had to wait in the office until I was finished with my work. It seemed to me, he was not so much concerned about the beauty of the outcome, but he was rather checking the functions of the typewriter.
Date of publication in German: March to 2011
Example by Hanna Vock, Bonn
Evelin surprised me at the age of 3;5 with an utterance which for three-year-olds is rather unusual. I had read the fairy tale “Hansel and Gretel” to Evelin and three other three years old girls. Evelin had not known this particular fairy tale before, which I checked with her mother. Evelin's comment at the end of the fairy tale: “But why do the children go back to their father, there's nothing to eat there. They could stay at the witch's house, now that the witch is dead. … After all, the father was bad.”
With this comment Evelin shows not only that she fully understood the contents of the tale at first hearing. She also displays an astonishing degree of independent and flexible thinking for a three-year-old. She is able to go beyond the story as told and have her own deliberations about it, which even contradict the original meaning of the story. In addition her questions imply the concept that children are capable of independent decisions: Hansel and Gretel are not to abide to the traditionally expected (going back home) but to do the unconventional and logically consequent, namely stay where there is food and no bad grown-ups being up to no good. Evelin judges the father's actions as clearly bad or even evil. Upon my enquiry “Why do you think the father is bad?” she answers “Because he left the children alone in the forest. He could have said to the mother: No, we can't do that.”
Evelin's cognitive and language skills not only enabled her to fully grasp the story but also to precisely express her own thoughts about it.
Compare this to a conversation about the fairy tale one week later:
The other three-year-olds (with average cognitive and language skills) answer the following questions:
Teacher: “What kind of animal does the witch have?”
Child #1: “A cat.”
Child #2: “And birds.”
Teacher: “What do the birds do?”
Child #2: “They're with the witch.”
Teacher: “And do they also eat something?”
Child #2: “No. Yes! They eat worms.“
Teacher asking child #3: „What do you think, do they eat anything else in the story?”
Child #3: “Yes.”
Teacher: “And what is that?”
Child #3: “Don't know.”
Evelin: “They pick up the bread crumbs, that's why the children can't find their way home. Because the crumbs aren't there any more. The birds ate them all.”
Date of publication in German: October 30 th , 2008
Example by Margrit Bernsmann, Köln
A kindergarten teacher, who is a native speaker of English, conducts some activities at tour kindergarten. Marcus (5;5) (name changed) is always very interested and always attends.
- One day the talk is of the English names for body parts. Marcus points to his eyes and says: “These are my eyes [continues in German:] and in German I can eat that.” [The English 'eye' and the German word for 'egg' sound exactly the same]
- Marcus is drawing English soldiers, all grouped in pairs, and makes the statement [in German]: “The Queen has one million soldiers, at least. The number must be even, so that there's always two who can walk together.”
- Neanderthal man is of great interest to Marcus. For days after a visit to the Neanderthal museum he keeps talking about what he has seen and implements his knowledge in many playing situations and when building something. As there are no special interest books on the topic at the kindergarten he brings books from the library and from home. At the “English Club” he asks the question: “Were there Neanderthal men in England?” This question has not been answered yet [in this group] …
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At lunch Marcus notices that there is steam rising from the potatoes in the bowl. Wondering about the reason for this he begins to reason: 'Water evaporates at great heat, so this will be the water from inside the potatoes', he gives himself the answer.
Date of publication in German: October 30 th , 2008
Examples by Hanna Vock, Bonn
A boy who already reads whole books, 5;9 years old, tells his mother after his first day at school:
“We coloured one sheet and learned the [letter] 'O' … tomorrow we're supposed to colour another sheet and find words starting with an 'O'. I told Ms S.: Yes, thanks, I'll resign then.“
Another 5 years old boy appears at his mother's bedside in the middle of the night and wakes her up to ask her: „How can the temperature of the sun be measured if the sun is so hot that it'll burn everything up right away?!”
A three and a half years old girl is happy on her first day of kindergarten: “That's easy to remember: that my sign is a sailing ship – it's got my name written next to it.”
Date of publication in German: October 30 th , 2008
Translated by Arno Zucknick
Copyright © Hanna Vock 2008, see Imprint