Today Cribsheet reader Tobi asks how other parents explain the election to their young ones.

After a conversation I had with Emmet the other day, I thought I would write to you and see what you thought about this Cribsheet topic.  It’s really just a solicitation for how others talk about the presidential campaign with their young kids.  Here’s the gist of the conversation:
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Scene:  Driving 5-year-old son to preschool one morning.  On the radio is a clip of a John Edwards campaign speech (before he withdrew).  Edwards is speaking very passionately, really riled up — it sounds like he’s MAD!
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Son:  Mom!  Who is that guy and why is he yelling?
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Me:   His name is John Edwards.  He is a very smart man who wants to be the President of the United States. But there are a lot of other people who want to be President, too.  So they have a what we call a “race” for President.  (And yes, I could see it coming . . . .)
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Son:  So, is the person who wins the person who runs the FASTEST?  Or is it the person who runs the LONGEST?  (Son then demonstrates, from his booster seat, how fast his arms and legs would move if he were running for President.)
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Me:  Well, in this race, it’s not about how fast you are or how long you run, but how SMART your ideas are, and how many people agree with your ideas.  So everyone votes on who has the best ideas, and whoever gets the most votes wins.
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Son:  Will they be very tired when the race is over?Â
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Me:  Oh yes.
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And on and on. The other thing about the conversation is that while I was telling him about some of the other candidates, I referred to one of them as “she,”  which really got me choked up.  I mean — How fantastic is it that my kids now have a good chance of growing up KNOWING — not just it a vague, someday sort of way — that a woman, or a non-caucasian — can be President!!??!!
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I wonder how other parents explain elections and politics to their kids who are too young to really “get it,” but definitely not too young to ask!
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-Tobi

This entry was posted on Tuesday, February 5th, 2008 at 9:30 am and is filed under Family Life, Guest Bloggers, Main. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.