Wednesday, January 29, 2014

News from a 4-year-old

Yesterday we lost Pete Seeger.

The Little Man, who just turned four,  heard Mommy and Daddy talking about  Pete.  He said, "I know about Pete Seeger.  He was the one who sang, 'This land is your land, this land is my land.'" 
Daddy, " Yes, that's right."  Little Man, looking very sad, "He's dead now."   "Yes, but he was 90 years older than you are now.  He lived a long life. "

I am wondering how the Little Man knew this and who told him that Pete was dead?   He does know about death and knows about it because he asked and we explained it to him.

I got the sense that they were talking about Pete Seeger in daycare...

I don't know if the daycare teachers would have mentioned that he died.  I don't really think so.  I think that might have been something the Little Man picked up from listening to the radio or somewhere else.

I wonder if the daycare teachers told them about the songs Pete was responsible for creating or if they thought it might be too much for them to understand?  Funny that "This Land is Your Land," is the song he walked away from the conversation with. This is a song that we used to sing in elementary school, well, only certain verses :)

Soon we will teach the Little Man the origins of the song and why Pete Seeger wanted to keep singing it.

How to teach him all the things we want/need to teach him?  I was blown away by how he chimed in to our conversation about the news with confidence and how much he knew and had put together on his own. 


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