Learning from the Innocence of Little Kids

General Introduction

The more I travel and meet people, families, and children in diverse cultures, the more I am convinced of the pure, naive, trusting, and innocence of children. I am not an expert in children's growth or development, but a few encounters cross-culturally have been very instructive. I grew up in a setting where the axiom “it takes a village to raise a child” was the norm. Because kids lack expansive and extensive life experiences, the guidance of adults was there to provide a sense of belonging, security, and welfare. Even in close family settings, parents and educators play significant roles in maintaining, providing, and shielding children from the harsh realities of life experiences. Kids are exposed today to more complex and distressing content than in yesteryears when I was growing up in Africa. Yet, the truism of this innocence is encapsulated in the words of the Rabbi and the Carpenter from Nazareth in the following passage from St. Matthew:

Then people brought little children to Jesus for him to place his hands on them and pray for them. But the disciples rebuked them. Jesus said, “Let the little children come to me, and do not hinder them, for the kingdom of heaven belongs to such as these.” Matthew 19:13-14 (NIV)" He knew their innocence in the fullness of it. Three experiences are the focus of this article, and they remind me daily not to despise or ignore kids even at their worst moments as they relate to adults.

Jesus loves all the little children of the world.

Encountering the Little One (1)

I was on my way from Pittsburgh to Waynesburg when my Toyota Highlander broke down on the road. A couple of gentlemen stopped to help with the leaking anti-freeze. One of them was a Gideonite who gave me some water to fill up the radiator. After driving a mile, the thermometer was high again and I knew I had to get the vehicle towed. It took the towing truck about one hour to get to my location. The driver came out with his young son, who was around five or six years old. The little fellow was a talker, very personable and engaging. He asked me many questions: “Tell me more about Africa; where do you live? How long have you lived in America?” He seemed very much wiser than his years as folks will say in some parts of the world. We sat together in front of the truck as we drove back to Waynesburg where the father eventually did some paperwork to give me the towing invoice and the cost of fixing the car the next day. I remained in conversation with the little guy for another 30 minutes as I waited for my ride to take me home. The father was a man of few words, only letting me know that his son is used to making friends with total strangers. He said he would sometimes caution him, but he felt comfortable with my conversation with his son. It was a very engaging experience making a stressful moment not so stressful. I had a fun time with the kid and his father and once in a while would stop by at his shop occasionally to say hello

Encountering the Little One (2)

I was a visiting lecturer at Taylor University in Upland, Indiana a few years ago when I came across three examples of kids whose encounters impacted me profoundly. The first encounter was when the Chair of the sociology department, Professor Mike Jessup took me out for lunch, and as we were about to pay for the service and leave, a little girl, no more than five or six months old was carried in a burping manner by the mother started chuckling, then laughing aloud. Her mom was shocked, then suddenly turned around and asked me: “What did you do to her?” “She has never laughed like that before.” I just chuckled back and told her; I do not know: your little daughter has been giggling and wiggling at me since you were on the line. I was thrilled about the incident and just wondered what kids can do when allowed to be free.

The second incident was waking up one Sunday morning to visit a different church for the first time. I sat adjacent to a young mother with a little boy who could not be more than four years old. We periodically made contact, and the little fellow would tell his mom: “he is looking at me” to which the mother responded, “That is alright, you can look at him too.” He repeated it the second time saying, “Mom, he is smiling at me”, to which the mom again said, “That is okay you can smile at him too.” The service ended and I greeted both the little fellow and the mom. At this time, he was shy, but the mother said, “Give him five, Nathan.” I left the church completely impressed by the young mother’s total control of the situation, making her son comfortable with a stranger of different race and ethnicity in the house of worship. This was an experience and a lesson I have told students in intercultural dynamics several times. Thirdly, it is also reminiscent of a similar Sunday school experience years ago where a little white boy around five opined that his friend, a brown-skinned kid had a brown skin color because he drinks too much chocolate. The entire adult laughed, but there is a significant lesson to learn from kids’ thinking and innocence.

My niece (Okiki) dancing to traditional mouth music during my visit to Nigeria in January

Encountering the Little One (3)

In early July, I had to get some work done with my doctor in preparation for the cataract surgery scheduled for July 25. As I sat in the waiting section for the nurse to call me in, a young mother with four kids came in and sat opposite where I sat. She had two boys and two girls. The younger boy waved at me and greeted me with a smile then proceeded to sit next to me in total rejection of the admonition by his mom to come next to her. Even the older brother could not dissuade the young fellow from sitting next to me. I have never met the family at all. He proceeded to tell me his name and the names of every member of the family and why they came to the clinic. When the older brother realized that he could not bring his younger brother to order, he joined us too and began to tell me how good he is as a big brother, the game he loves to play, and what he plans to do in the future. The mother was stunned in silence but was also looking at us curiously. It was refreshing to see these kids completely without inhibitions exhibiting courage, innocence, and friendliness that are often hindered or stifled as we are socialized sometimes to see the “other” as not worthy of even casual friendliness or conversation. The nurse called them in, and we greeted each other goodbye, with the mother now proud of the conduct of the kids in the face of her initial resistance. Kids are capable of instructing and enlightening us to be free from the frozenness and rigidity of thinking that we have because of negative socialization. It was both a learning and teaching moment for me.

This is Mia, the daughter of a former student meeting a little black boy. A couple of years later, she saw me at Walmart and told her mom: ‘Look this is Cheek” - she could not pronounce my name, Ezekiel. I was shocked she still remembered me.

Conclusion:

Albert Einstein once asserted: “It is not that I am so smart, it is just that I stay with the problem longer. From my little observations, children often demonstrate innate curiosity and imagination that enable them to ask questions that grownups often restrain themselves from asking or even responding to. Some have even called them natural philosophers. Whether they are precocious or rambunctious, their repetitive desires to have an answer should prod us to find a framework to explain things to them. Children challenge us to stay with the problem longer. I vividly remember growing up asking my dad, “Where do babies come from”, to which he culturally referred me to my mother, I would also ask: “Why is that person so tall? Where do monsters come from?” As a child, I could relate to the prior example of a kid opining that another kid had brown skin because he drank too much chocolate. Kids can see connections between things intuitively. This may be comical, but it also allows us to see how they process information, observations, and their little experiences of life. It is neither good to dismiss nor ignore them. Their curiosities should be seen as providing a substantive perspective on the questions of life and existence. Engaging their little world and little minds can go a long way to fostering a habit for learning and exploration of ideas that will have lasting effects on the family, the community, and the world. They are surely the hope of the future.