Speaking With Children So They Can Think

I remember my first exposure to the "technology" of treating children like fully formed human beings -- and I often do think of it as a kind of technology in that it's the application of scientific knowledge for practical purposes. I'd previously been exposed to this technology via my daughter's preschool teacher, with whom I'd been working as a cooperative classroom parent for many months, but, as technology often does for the uninitiated, it just looked like magic, something Teacher Chris was able to do because she was Teacher Chris.

I was in one of Tom Drummond's classes at North Seattle College and he began to explain the ultimate ineffectiveness of "directive" statements. You know the kind, "Sit over here," "Stand there," "Pick that up," the sorts of adult communications with which most of our childhoods were filled. I had a small epiphany as he explained our assignment to us, which was to simply keep track of the number of directive statements we made during our next classroom day. And even as I had the epiphany that this was a part of Teacher Chris' magic trick, I doubted that it could really work, at least not all time, not for all kids, not for all ages. It was good that our assignment was simply about ourselves, about listening to our words, practicing using this new technology, not being burdened with the complications of having to make judgments about how the children were responding, just focusing on ourselves and the words we were using.

It felt incredibly awkward, then, replacing my directive statements with informative ones. For instance, instead of saying, "Pick up that block," I would try to make the more cumbersome informative statement, "I see a block on the floor and it's clean up time." One of the basic ideas, Tom explained, was that unlike directive statements which tend to shut things down, informative statements create a space in which the kids get to do their own thinking, make their own decisions about their own behavior, instead of merely engaging in the power struggle that inevitably emerges from being bossed around. It made sense to me even while it felt strange and artificial. It was true, I couldn't help but notice, that when I took the time to be informative, children were far less likely to push back rebelliously, and instead take a beat (which, I've learned means they are taking a moment to process the information you've given them) then pick up that block and put it away. 

I discovered, on my own, the truth of Tom's assertion that the ultimate weakness of relying upon directive statements is that, over time, they need to be escalated in intensity. I recall standing in our school's parking lot with a much more experienced parent as she yelled angrily after her kids, "Get your butts over here!" only to have them giggle and scamper away. When she grumbled, "I never thought I'd be the kind of parent who spanked her kids, but I'm almost there," I saw a glimpse of a place I didn't want to go.

And I still had doubts, even as I began to practice with my own preschooler, who soon detected the change in my approach and began to object to it as "teacher talk." I felt a little guilty, like a magician letting the public in on my trick, as I explained to her what I was trying to do. I remember my five-year-old agreeing that it sounded like a good idea. She especially appreciated that I wouldn't be bossing her around, even suggesting she would be happy to help me by pointing out when I slipped up. I thought for sure that I'd ruined everything by letting the cat out of the bag, but if anything, the opposite happened. She became my ally in making "teacher talk" a more natural part of my day-to-day language until I've arrived at a point in my life when parents refer to "Teacher Tom magic." 

And still, despite all the evidence, despite all my ever-increasing expertise in using it, I was suspicious that the technology of treating children as fully formed human beings would stop "working" as they got older and more sophisticated. 

The father of one of my daughter's classmates was a high school teacher, a good one by all accounts; jovial, casual, humorous. I think I would have liked being in his class. As our kids approached middle school he explained his philosophy of dealing with teens to me: "Oh, I'm their best friend until they cross the line, then Bam! I come down like a house of bricks." By this time, I'd become quite confident in the use of my "teacher talk" technology when it came to preschoolers, had seen its effectiveness with my own eyes, had even customized it for my own use, but listening to this guy who everyone admired, I wondered if maybe I was, at least as a parent, going to need to adopt some of this "house of bricks" technique as my own. Well, here I am today, the parent of an adult child, a kid who capably navigated all the regular high school stuff we worry about, and I never felt the need to "come down" like a house of bricks. In fact, just as I did when she was five, I found it much more productive to lay it all out for her as honestly and informatively as possible, revealing my emotions, my dilemma as a parent, my concerns for her safety or her morals or her future or her reputation or whatever. No one makes great decisions all the time, but she's had a lifetime of practice, and most of the time she comes up with perfectly reasonable solutions.

None of this is magic. Like all technology it still works, often even better, when everyone knows how it works. Over the years, I've been working on a framework for shifting the way I speak with the children in my life and the result is a 6-part course, "The Technology of Speaking with Children So They Can Think." If you're interested, registration for the 2024 cohort for this course is now open! Click here to learn more.

I've now come to a point at which I have complete trust in the technology of treating children like fully formed human beings. Indeed, it's a technology that works on all fully formed human beings no matter what their age and it starts with the assumption that I can never, whatever your age, command you into doing anything. My primary responsibility is to speak informatively, and to leave a space in which thinking can take place.

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The language we use creates reality. In this registration course we will explore how the way we speak with children creates an environment in which cooperation and peacefulness are the norm, where children take the initiative, solve their own problems, and, most importantly, think for themselves. If this sounds good to you, now is the time to join this year's cohort! Click here for more information and to register.

I put a lot of time and effort into this blog. If you'd like to support me please consider a small contribution to the cause. Thank you!

"Keep Out"

I certainly hope that this sign is effective, but I have my doubts

As we make our way around the modern world, there are a lot of signs telling us what to do.

Keep Out

Stay off the Grass

No Parking

And almost as often, we see that the fence on the other side of which we are forbidden is bent down or even cut away by people who would not be kept out. We see paths worn across the grass we are to keep off. And we regularly see vehicles parked in no parking zones. We see dogs running freely in areas designated with signage clearly scolding, "Dogs Must Be Leashed," not to mention the piles of poo next to the sign that commands, "Pick Up After Your Dog." We may shake our heads and tut, even as we cross against a light that says, "Don't Walk."

I've spent a lot of time in airports where I strive to abide by all the signs that tell me what to do and what not. Most people do the same because we all know that the consequences for violating them can be immediate and harsh. This is the only way to make commands consistently stand up -- not just to threaten punishment, but to immediately and harshly follow through. 

As people who work with young children, we seen this phenomenon at work every day. Most of us make rules and, like with the adults who won't be kept out, some of the kids a lot of the time and all of the kids some of the time, break those rules. If we don't enforce them with punishment, the rules continue to be broken. If we do, we live in a place in which people behave as we want because they fear the consequences, not because it's the right thing to do. Maybe that's okay at an airport, but in a classroom? In a home? Do we really want our children growing up in this kind of environment?

I have no interest in creating the kind of world in which I use my power to control others. I want to use my power to empower others and that means creating an environment in which people -- in this case children -- are free to make smart decisions.

You know what sign always works? The one that says "Out of Order" on a public restroom toilet stall. I guarantee I'm not going in there. In fact, I'm not going to even look in there. And in all my 62 years of using pubic restrooms, I've never seen anyone else do it either. What sets this signed apart from the others I've mentioned is that it's not phrased as a command: it provides information. And information allows us to think for ourselves in a way that "Keep Out" doesn't.

If instead of "Keep Out" the sign read, "Sewage Treatment" I expect no one would be cutting through the fence. If instead of "Stay off the Grass" it read "Newly Seeded Lawn," I expect more people would decide to stick to the sidewalk. If instead of "No Parking" the sign read "Fire Lane" or "Police Parking" or "Free Parking Around the Corner" I'm certain that most people, most of the time, would use that information to decide to park elsewhere.

Yes, I'm aware that selfish people often park their cars in spots designated for handicapped drivers, but I've noticed that instead of "Handicapped Parking" the signs often read "Handicapped Parking Only" a difference that turns information into a command.

And humans do not typically respond well to being told what to do, no matter what our age. Commands not backed up by the threat of punishment are rarely effective. Even punishment doesn't work particularly well, unless, of course, the punisher is present, or the punishment is so severe, like at airports, that it's somehow debilitating. And I will not do anything to children that's debilitating.

In my course The Technology of Speaking With Children So They Can Think, we take a deep dive into how apparently simple changes in how we speak with children can transform not only the behavior of the important children in our lives, but also our relationships with both them and ourselves as educators and parents. If the goal is for children to learn to think for themselves, we are well served to be suspicious of directive language and embrace the art and science of speaking informatively with children. If this sounds like something that could make your life better, click here to learn more and to join the waitlist for the 2024 cohort of The Technology of Speaking With Children So They Can Think.

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In this course we explore how changing the way we speak with children can create environments in which cooperation and peacefulness are the norm, where children take the initiative, solve their own problems, and, most importantly, think for themselves. It will transform your classroom or home into a place in which children are self-motivated to do the right thing, not because you said so, but because they've made up their own mind. Group discounts are available. Registration for the 2024 cohort begins tomorrow, May 7, 2024. Click here for more information and to get on the waitlist.

I put a lot of time and effort into this blog. If you'd like to support me please consider a small contribution to the cause. Thank you!

Clean Up Time Without Bossing the Kids Around

In a comment on yesterday's post about my course The Technology of Speaking With Children So They Can Think, a reader asked for more specific examples of how we can step back from the language of command. I would assert that in most preschool classrooms, the time we tend to boss the kids around the most is when it comes time to tidying up so I thought I'd start there.

When my wife Jennifer and I bought our first house, I spent the first weeks wandering from room-to-room, into the yard, and out to the garage thinking, This is our room. This is our yard. This is our garage. I even once lay on my back in the lawn and told myself, "This is our piece of the sky." I was telling myself those things, because it didn't yet seem real. It wasn't until after I'd mowed that lawn a few times that I began to believe it. It wasn't until I changed the furnace filter, pruned the forsythia, and repaired a cabinet hinge that it was really felt like ours. It was only then that I could get down to the business of living in that house, and caring for it, instead of just wandering its rooms like a guest.

The children often call our school, "Teacher Tom's school." I remind them, "It's not my school, it's your school," but it's more a statement of aspiration than reality until they've started taking care of it themselves, and the place most of the children start is clean-up time.

As a cooperative preschool with all those extra adults in the room, it would be easy to just leave it to them and it would get done, and done well, in about 5 minutes. Instead, however, I instruct the parents to leave as much to the children as they possibly can, even if it takes a half hour and even if the results leave a lot to be desired. Rather than being an annoying, yet necessary part of our day to hurry through, this act of coming together to care for our school is the single most important community building activity on our daily schedule.

Here's how it works in my 3-5's class . . .

The song

I announce clean-up time by beating my drum and singing, to the tune of the Snow White And The Seven Dwarfs song Heigh Ho:

Hey hey

Hey hey

Put everything away

Into the place

In which it stays

Hey hey

Hey hey hey hey hey hey

It typically takes a few weeks, but before long, most of the kids, most of the time, go into action with the first beat of the drum. The rest might need a couple minutes to finish what they're doing, and that's understandable.

Speaking informatively

I expect the adults to avoid bossing the children around with directional statements like, "Pick up the blocks," or "Put the dolls in the crib," but instead strive to make simple informational statements like, "There's a block on the floor," or "The dolls go in the crib." This might sound like a distinction without a difference, but it's important. Humans instinctively resist being told what to do, even preschoolers, and this is especially true when it comes to an activity like clean up. When we command children, we give them two options: obey or disobey. But when we provide information, we open up a space in which they can think for themselves. It's clean up time. I could help clean up. There's a block on the floor. I could put it on the shelf. 

I'd rather focus our energies on coming together to take care of the school than in power struggles between adults and 3-year-olds. Informational statements are the only way I know how to do that. When we respond to a child's complaint of, "I don't wanna clean up," with an informational statement like, "It's clean-up time," we are avoiding a time sucking battle of the wills by not giving them anything to fight against.

I cruise the room, making informational statements like, "We need lots of help in the drama area," "The stuffed animals go in the basket," and "There are counting bears under the table." The trick is to be patient. The kids aren't always going to respond right away. You need to give them a chance to process your statements and make decisions for themselves, because that's the kind of space informational statements leave for the children -- a decision-making space. This isn't about obedience, it's about allowing children to make their own choices, then verbally noticing when they take action to care for their own school: "Max is helping clean-up the drama area," "Alex is putting the stuffed animals in the basket," "Sophia is picking up the counting bears from under the table."

I'm not praising them. I'm not saying, "Thank you." It's their school, of course they're taking care of it. I'm merely making a point of noticing the children who are participating in clean-up time, just as I would notice the children who were participating in circle time by raising their hands.

When children continue to play during clean-up, I give them informational statements like, "This is not playing time, it's clean-up time," or "That's closed. We're cleaning up now." I then follow it up with a directly applicable informational statement like, "The playdough goes in the playdough container."

When a child wants to talk to me during clean-up time, I ask, "Is it about clean-up?" If they say, "No," I answer, "You'll have to save it until circle time because it's clean-up time now. I only want to talk about clean-up." My own desires and opinions are informational statements and during clean-up time I'm a single purpose clean-up machine.

When a child simply retires to a corner with a book, or sits quietly, I let it go. That child will eventually join us, if not today, then in the future.

And finally, when all else fails, in those rare instances when a child steadfastly continues to play in a way the disrupts or impedes the group activity of clean-up, they are given the choice to either join clean-up or "stay out of the way." A few children make this choice, but most give it up after a few seconds, opting instead for the action taking place in the room.

"Big projects": planning ahead

Two years ago, a parent remodeled her kids' bed room and donated a nice set of shelves and cabinets that gave us a lot more "in classroom" storage space, so much so that we even had room to store our large wooden blocks near our block play area rather than out in the hallway. As we were setting up to start the school year I instructed a couple parents to move the blocks. Malcomb's mom Carol said, "Aw, really? It won't be the same place without the kids taking the blocks to you in the hallway."

She was right and I relented on the spot. Taking the big blocks into the hallway is a "big project" and it generally involves well over half of the kids. As I wait to receive the blocks, I sing my observational statements to the children, usually forcing it into the tune of our clean-up song:

I see

Sarah

Bringing a medium block

And here comes Marcus

With a big one.

Hey hey

Hey hey hey hey hey hey

Hey hey

And Peter is pushing his

Across the floor

While Alex

And Orlando

Are working together

Hey hey

Hey hey hey hey . . .

They have to carry those heavy blocks, some larger than they are, from the classroom, up two steps, and around a corner to were I'm waiting. The doorway causes a bottleneck where they are forced to negotiate that small two-way space while managing heavy, bulky blocks, and the stairs are a real hazard for some of them. It takes a real team effort to make this work and it's wonderful to see all the different ways they do it. Some try to carry 3 blocks at once, while other single blocks are ushered into the hallway by 5 sets of hands. Some push blocks across the floor, while others carry them on their heads. And all the while I'm singing to them, informationally, "Hey, hey, hey hey . . ."

It's useful to plan at least one "big project" clean-up activity every day. Removing wet things from the water table to drip dry on towels can be one of those projects. Moving large objects like our boxes from one place to another will do. Turning over a table that's been tipped on its side can be made into a group effort ("I need lots of strong people to turn this table over!"). So can bringing chairs back into the room from the hallway ("We need 6 chairs at the green table and 4 at the blue table.")

The "big project" is one of the best ways to get everyone involved and there is no better way to build community than engaging in a big project together, shoulder-to-shoulder.

The story of us

When the school year starts, participation on some days might only be around 50 percent, but I have faith that if we (meaning the adults) remain consistent in our commitment to speaking informatively and not worrying about incidental things like how long it's taking or how well it's done, most of the children, most of the time will get involved.

I approach clean-up time with the steadfast expectation that every child will pitch in and that every parent will join me in speaking informatively about what needs to be done. Realistically, an adult needs to step in and handle anything that require sanitizing or to put the finishing touches on the sweeping, but most of the time, the kids do most of the work.

That said, like with any preschool activity, there are always a few kids who opt out, but by mid-year it's rarely more than 1-2 kids each day, and they quickly see that they're missing out. It's hard to resist carrying a block or two out into the hallway where Teacher Tom is singing a silly song, or joining your friends in the effort to right-side-up a heavy table.

I spend most of my time on most day simply narrating what I see happening, naming names. "I see Marissa hanging up costumes." "Jody and Marcus are working together on the Legos." As I do, I feel as if I'm telling the story of us. And most children, most of the time, when left to make their own decisions, opt to be part of that story.

It's not my school, after all, it's the kid's school. And the only way to make that true is to take care of it together. 

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This post is an example of The Technology of Speaking With Children at work. In this course we will explore how the way we speak with children creates an environment in which cooperation and peacefulness are the norm, where children take the initiative, solve their own problems, and, most importantly, think for themselves. Registration for the 2024 cohort begins next week. Click here for more information and to get on the waitlist.

I put a lot of time and effort into this blog. If you'd like to support me please consider a small contribution to the cause. Thank you!

Treating Children Like People Rather than Their Challenging Behavior

Over the last two decades, I’ve worked to understand challenging behavior in children. And more often than not, I find that the problem is me, not them.

 

When I look back on my day and feel it was largely spent dealing with uncooperative children, I’ve learned to look at myself.

 

When I feel that I’m “losing control,” I’ve learned to look at myself.

 

And when I resort to threats, scolding, or other authoritarian tactics, I’ve learned that the problem is definitely me.

We’ve all been there. I know this because my inbox is full of messages from educators and parents desperate for help.

 

It used to frustrate me, for instance, when children refused to participate in group activities like clean-up or circle time. I now know that they weren’t reacting to the activity as much as to the way I was speaking to them about it. Psychologists, philosophers, and neuroscientists agree: the language we use creates reality. And so often, the way we speak with children leaves them with little choice but to ignore us, resist, or otherwise behave in ways that we label as challenging.

Eventually, through much trial and error, I discovered how so many of us inadvertently create environments in which the children in our lives are actively discouraged from thinking for themselves. No wonder they rebel! Over the years, I’ve developed a comprehensive approach to communicating with young children in a way that frees them up to rely upon their own better angels instead of the constant direction of adults. The result is a 6-week course I call The Technology of Speaking With Children So They Can Think. It delivers a whole new paradigm, built upon thoughtfully changing how we actually speak with children . . . and with everyone else, for that matter. 

It’s a way of creating a new reality through language in which so-called “challenging behaviors” in children are greatly reduced and in many cases eliminated; where children are enabled to make their own decisions; and where adults are freed from the need to behave like authoritarian task-masters.

It’s an approach that frees children to think for themselves, while enabling educators and parents to create a world in which children listen and cooperate, not because they said so, but because they've chosen to do so.

The best part of all of this is that when you adopt this "technology," you will find yourself being the kind of teacher or parent you always imagined yourself being -- one who is the calm, confident, authoritative (not authoritarian) presence young children need in their lives.

I'll be sharing more details about the course in the coming days, so stay tuned. If this sounds like something you want to know more about, click here to get on the waitlist for the 2024 cohort.

In the meantime, in the coming days, when confronted with challenging behavior, pause for a moment to ask yourself, "Is it me?" And if it is, ask yourself how you would want to be spoken to if the shoe were on the other foot. Because at the end of the day, the "technology" I'm talking about is the one of treating children, even very young children, like people rather than their challenging behavior.

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The language we use creates reality. In this course we will explore how the way we speak with children creates an environment in which cooperation and peacefulness are the norm, where children take the initiative, solve their own problems, and, most importantly, think for themselves. Click here to get on the waitlist for the 2024 cohort.

I put a lot of time and effort into this blog. If you'd like to support me please consider a small contribution to the cause. Thank you!

They Taught Themselves

Some time ago, we took the children on a field trip to the local post office. We were a group of some 20 children and eight adults. The woman giving us our tour introduced herself as Ms. Lui, before insisting that the children get in a line. It was an inauspicious start. The kids had no idea what to do. Even we adults were at a loss. Queueing up isn't part of what we do at Woodland Park.

I could see Ms. Lui was irritated with us. She tried to remain cheerful, but it was through gritted teeth. When I explained that we didn't know how to line up, I reckon she thought me the worst teacher in the world.

As a play-based educator, I strive, against a lifetime of training to the contrary, to resist the temptation to exert power over the children which is what we do when we insist on things like marching in lines or sitting in straight rows. It's what we do when we insist on zippered lips, dress codes, or asking permission to use the toilet. School is notoriously a place of rules and regulations, of teachers in the role of drill sergeant, or, if I'm being honest, prison guard.

I am responsible for the children's safety and general well-being, of course, and in that capacity there may be times when I cannot allow a child to do certain things, like jumping off the roof of a three story building, but by default, any power that comes my way by virtue of my titles of "teacher" or "adult" is to be returned to the children in the form of empowerment.

I can make an argument for this position from moral grounds, but my genuine motivation is simply to be a good teacher. I'm familiar with the research on the effects of people possessing more power than others and I've concluded that when I exert power over children, especially the capricious and arbitrary kind of power exerted in most classroom, I'm doing direct harm to the children's educational prospects.

As Rutger Bregman writes in his book Humankind: "One of the effects of power, myriad studies show, is that it makes you see others in a negative light. If you're powerful you're more likely to think most people are lazy and unreliable. That they need to be supervised and monitored, managed and regulated, censored and told what to do. And because power makes you feel superior to other people, you'll believe all this monitoring should be entrusted to you . . . Tragically, not having power has exactly the opposite effect. Psychological research shows the people who feel powerless also feel far less confident. They're hesitant to voice an opinion. In groups, they make themselves seem smaller, and they under-estimate their own intelligence."

That adults should exert power over children is so ingrained in us that many cannot imagine it any other way, but by doing so we make the children smaller, we make them feel ignorant, and we undermine their confidence. 

We've all experienced educators who are convinced that the children are lazy, that they can't be trusted, that they must be constantly monitored and managed. It's a kind of self-fulfilling prophecy. 

I asked Ms. Lui if we could just promise to stick together as a group. She didn't think that would work at all. She wanted us, on the spot, while on a field trip to a place of great excitement, to instruct them on how lines worked. Fortunately, there was a painted line on the floor so we asked the kids to stand on the line. Most of them tried it out for a moment or two, but as empowered children they were far more attuned to their curiosity than standing on a line. Some wandered off. Some pointed and asked questions. Others negotiated with their friends over their exact position on the line. After several minutes of this cat herding project, I turned to Ms. Lui and said, "This is the best we can do. Do you really need us to march in a line?"

It was a simple question, but it stumped her. After muttering something about "keeping order" she shrugged, adding, "Can you at least tell them not to touch anything?"

That I could do, although even then, I returned the power to these empowered children: "There's a lot of stuff around here that could hurt you. Ms. Lui wants you to ask her before touching anything." I did not command them, but rather gave them information.

She shook her head as she led the way. At every point-of-interest, from the sorting machines to the post office boxes, the children asked, "Can I touch this?" or "What would happen if I touched that?" At first her tone was slightly scolding, but gradually she began to relax, even seeming to take pleasure in the children's obvious curiosity, their confidence, and their willingness to voice their ideas and opinions.

In preparation for this visit, we had written letters addressed to ourselves. Ms. Lui showed us the outgoing mail slot and the children, unprompted, lined up, one-behind-another, to deposit their letters. She was by now in fine spirits. I joked, "See? We can line up."

She lowered her eyebrows at me, "I thought you said they didn't know how to line up."

I replied, "I didn't think they did. Maybe they just didn't need to know it until now."

This time when she shook her head it was with a sense of wonder, "I guess they taught themselves."

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The language we use creates reality. In this course we will explore how the way we speak with children creates an environment in which cooperation and peacefulness are the norm, where children take the initiative, solve their own problems, and, most importantly, think for themselves. Click here to get on the waitlist for the 2024 cohort.

I put a lot of time and effort into this blog. If you'd like to support me please consider a small contribution to the cause. Thank you!

She Would Have Just As Soon Continued Wondering

Dale Chihuly

One of my favorite science writers is Carlo Rovelli, the Italian theoretical physicist and author of a dozen or so books, most of which are concisely written with the lay reader in mind. What makes him compelling is that he writes about those places where the scientist must be a philosopher and vice versa. In our modern world, we've come to fetishize science as the arbiter of truth, but what Rovelli does is revel in the reality that much of science is the act of wondering about the unknown.

As musician Tom Waits puts it, "Everything is explained now. We live in an age when you say casually to somebody, 'What's the story on that?' and they can run to the computer and tell you within five seconds. That's fine, but sometimes I'd just as soon continue wondering. We have a deficit of wonder right now."

Nothing grinds my teeth harder these days than sentences that begin, "Science tells us . . ." I write this fully aware that I've penned dozens of such sentences right here on the blog. But increasingly I find that when someone, including myself, does this, when someone asserts something like, "Neuroscientist's tell us . . ." they are attempting, at least at some level, to replace wonder with certainty. The more I read Rovelli and others (e.g., Robin Wall Kimmerer, David Hoffman, Patrick House) who work on the cutting edge of science, however, the more I come to appreciate that actual scientists tend to begin their sentences with "Our theory leads us to think . . ." or "Anthropologists suspect . . . " or, best of all, "I've come to believe . . ." They leave the wonder in there.

This may not be satisfying to those pity-worthy people who crave certainty. Those who cling, for instance, to the snake oil that is being called "The Science of Reading," often smugly boast that "the science is settled." If it's settled, it's not science, it's dogma. And while dogma may give us the illusion of certainty, it always winds up standing in the way of truth.

Schooling teaches us that the point of questions is answers. Life itself teaches us that the point of questions is wonder.

We had an old-fashioned hamster wheel at our school. Every day, often all day, a child would stop to show their wonder about this strange, out-of-place contraption. It was used by some to explore centripetal force, others included it in their dramatic play, some turned it over and drove it like some sort of one-wheeled vehicle. There was always some new way to include it in their play. One day, as a girl was using the circular part of the wheel as fencing for her herd of little ponies, a well-meaning adult informed her that she was playing with a hamster wheel. The girl asked, "Do we have any hamsters?" When she learned we didn't, she took her ponies elsewhere. Unsolicited answers have a way of shutting down wonder. Like Tom Waits, she would have just as soon continued wondering.

Yesterday, I came across a recently published scientific paper entitled "On the roles of function and selection in evolving systems," written by a 9-person team comprised of astrophysicists, geologists, and philosophers. In it, they propose a "missing law of nature." Of course, a journalist writing about the paper immediately attempted to frame their "discovery" with certainty, saying they "claim they have identified a missing law of nature," when, in fact, they do nothing of the sort. They wonder about it.

From the abstract:

The universe is replete with complex evolving systems, but the existing macroscopic physical laws do not seem to adequately describe these systems.

". . . do not seem . . ." That is an assertion of wonder.

Recognizing that the identification of conceptual equivalencies among disparate phenomena were foundational to developing previous laws of nature, we approach a potential "missing law" by looking for equivalencies among evolving systems. We suggest that all evolving systems -- including but not limited to life -- are compose of diverse components that can combine into configurational states that are then selected for or against based on function.

" . . . a potential "missing law" . . ." "We suggest . . ." " . . . that can combine . . ." Wonder.

When we identify the fundamental sources of selection -- static persistence, dynamic persistence, and novelty generation -- and propose a time-asymmetric law that states that the functional information of a system will increase over time when subjected to selection for function(s).

They do not, as the journalist claims, say they have "discovered" anything, but rather wondered their way into a proposed "law." In other words, they have given the rest of us a hamster wheel to wonder about.

They call this "The Law of Increasing Functional Information."

Building on Charles Darwin's famous theory of natural selection, which suggests that function exists to ensure the survival of the fittest when it comes to living things, these researchers, astoundingly, assert that it may also be applicable to non-living systems. Holy cow! What an exciting idea!

They point out that the universe is made of complex systems, from entire planets to atoms, that perpetuate themselves in ways that look strikingly like Darwin's theory. You can read the paper for yourself, but the part that jumps out at me is their suggestion that one of the ways that the natural selection of systems takes place is through "novelty generation." Dynamic systems of all kinds "explore new configurations which can lead to surprising new behaviors and characteristics." 

Isn't that exactly what children do when they are free to play: Explore new configurations which can lead to surprising new behaviors and characteristics? We know that many, if not most, animals play. Indeed, we are increasingly coming to believe that play is a key driver of evolution in animals. There are even those who have suggested that plants play. And now here we are considering the amazing idea that all of nature's systems -- living and non-living -- play. Not only that, this behavior that, at a minimum, shares a great deal with what we call play, behavior that is on its face non-functional, may be a key part of a foundational "law" describing how the entire universe functions.

That's something cool to wonder about.

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