A likely familiar tune, but bedtime at our house is borderline ritualism: Bath. Brush teeth. Story. Shine the flashlight on the ceiling to make the the glow stars light. Song. Some idle talking about the day past. At least three drinks of water. And a small peppering of parental nudges to “get back into bed!”
Ritualism, and in that order.
Lately, and this evening being no exception, we’ve been adding the list. I’ve been hearing the faint voice summoning me from down the hall, a tired little …

…this is about making science and the spoils of kid’s creative and critical thought a rewarding experience in and of itself.

The more I understand the critically thinking mind, the more I now fill those gaps in my flawed memory with the logical bits of deduction and reason, rather than invented concepts and explanations.

The toy did not make any outrageous claims about its own educational value. It just came in a neat little package as if to say, this toy is so cool who cares if it teaches anything because its just freaking insects for kids.

I mention this because it struck me as another one of those “meta” moments for this blog, even now as I continue to narrow out my little niche a mere twenty-five posts along in this endeavor.

The question that burned in the back of my mind was this: what are the the key skills that define moral, skeptical, critical thought and how would one go about imparting those skills to a child?