Scorpions in the Bed and Pink Dolphins – Getting the Conversation Started

First let me apologize for not writing something sooner – I have been so busy!  Between back to back school readings and library visits, to sales for Dandy Lion and then that pesky running my own website and graphic design business as well as getting the latest Hamilton Troll book featuring Elwood Woodpecker published and updates to the site done and then there is the 81 pages I am now up to in the creation of the Coloring and Activity book… I’ve been just a tad bit busy.

That being said, lets get on with it…

The other day at the library, I did a reading for some children and I asked my regular question of “Who likes to write?” which started a great dialog with the children about what they write about, or what they could write about and before I knew it I was getting told the most hilarious and skin-crawling story about a girls’ mother and a scorpion (actually sitting on her arm) while sleeping in bed! I was squirming in my seat listening to this tale and the other children were listening, as well as adding their own experiences of scorpions…

what is it with the scary critters that gets a kids excitement peaked? 

There was a scary story of a scorpion in the shower, one that stung a puppy dogs nose sending him flying into the trash can behind him (laughter ensued) to one that dropped from the ceiling and one on a towel.

Now, I’m not saying anything one way or another regarding these scary stories except to say, it really got the kids involved, however there is just as much to say about pink dolphins and Unicorns. Did you know there really are PINK Dolphins? They live in fresh water rivers and are rare, but they DO exist! So why can’t unicorns?  It was brought to my attention that even the bible mentions unicorns, and they might have simply gone extinct.  It was quite a unique conversation that made me ponder things for a long time.

I guess what this post boils down to is; get the kids involved in the discussions.  Sometimes I find it hard to get the discussion going, asking a kid what he or she wants to be when they grow up may receive the phrase “A fireman” but how do you keep them talking after that? But “tell me a scary story…” will always get the conversation started!  Who hasn’t been scared?

Maybe it’s the fact that it actually happened, it was a real experience, maybe it was because of the reaction it receives, maybe it’s because children really do want to talk but they don’t know what to talk about.

Either way I was again taught a valuable lesson by the children I intended to teach.