10-Nov-06 (Created: 10-Nov-06) | More in 'Humanities 2007'

Google Dinosaur

I sit on a high perch. I assume and often believe I could teach my 4 year old what to think and inturn shape and mold. There is an assumption that I know more, not only in some, but all matters. I am only humbled by what a beehive of a Brain these youngsters are gifter with, something I neither possessed or lost some where on the way.

He asked me one day what a "singleton" was. For a programmer by profession this was a daunting challenge to answer correctly. Programmers have gained and lost large sums based on their answer to this interview question. Well I was quite sure a 3 year olds brain is not yet clouded by such concerns. So I have patiently, having some background where he was coming from, explained that when you stand alone, when you are not with your friends, when you are one that stands out, then you could be called a "singleton" as it happened in the movie "Sandlot". "Singleton" hasn't arrived into my vocabulary before mid 20s.

He patiently listened everyone telling him Red means stop and Green means Go. He patiently waited for the car to follow the mores. And lately he has been wondering lately whether he could wish "red" was "green" and "green" was "red". I asked him what he means. Well we could go when it is red and stop when it is green. That doesn't make him upside down kid I have reasoned.

He found a little toy learning computer that makes him identify alphabets, objects etc. He has been figuring this out on his own mostly. It would tell him what is the button he pressed. For a couple of days he had been wondering and actually "scheming" as to its reaction if he were to press two buttons one after the other and laughing out loud the ensuing cacophony. Even If I wanted I couldn't have been able to teach him that. I am humbled at these little brains.

He reluctantly and impatiently sits next to me on some evenings while I work on my laptop and while he was watching something on the TV. His one eye is on my laptop waiting for me to allow him to press the keys. He said last night "Dinosaur". There is no Dinosaur on my laptop. I have Google search screen. Well for him that is where he finds dinosaur images. The quickness of association is lightening fast.

That brain at that age is humming.