Readers — Did you hear about the New Year’s Eve discovery of a supernova by a 10-year-old? Pretty cool. That inspired Mental idntkakitd
Floss — one of the best-loved magazines at our house — to come up with a list of “10 Amazing Discoveries by Kids.”
Having dreamed of becoming an archeologist (my book is dedicated to the teacher who took us junior high kids on a real dig), I was particularly envious of the 9-year-old who found one of the world’s most intact skeletons ever — of a boy 2 million years older than him. What’s more: right next to that skeleton was the skeleton’s mom! (Did parents helicopter even back then?)
The rest of the discoveries are almost as amazing. Tell me YOU’RE not a little jealous when you read about the toddler who found an ancient pendant worth $4 million.
That’s a lot of Goldfish crackers. Read on! (Or go outside — maybe there’s  another supernova out there.) — L.
Thanks for a great afternoon read!
Hopefully my Monkey will discover something – he already thinks he’s “legendary” at age 2 🙂
I told my oldest about the supernova yesterday. She was quite impressed. I love telling the kids about things children can accomplish, especially if there’s any remote similarity in age.
Has anyone got an idea where the kid with the CFC alternative published his paper. I searched article databases and turned up dry. And Google gives a grand total of 2 hits, neither of which are what I’m looking for.
Maybe it’s jealously, as you say. Sour grapes, if you will. Full disclosure: I also had the — I’m gonna be an archeologist dream — and went so far as to major in it in college (became the more general anthropology in the end though). And what came of it? Nuttin. So maybe that’s why.
But I can’t help but wonder if this article is more fodder for the — it’s not good enough that a kid just sit, stare, and wonder at the stars, or thoughtlessly observe nature for a while. All childhood activity has to lead to something worthwhile and preferably something to further tyke along future career path — disease that plagues modern childhood. And some of these “kids” apparently attend universities, publishing papers and experimenting with new surgery techniques. I don’t know how realistically inspiring that is to an average child. Or should be, to be frank.
And besides that, how’s a middle-aged person of middling intelligence supposed to find an archeology gig with all these genius kids running around?
Sorry for being off topic, but I think you’d be proud of these kids…. and of the police who want to give the kids an award – and NOT punish the parents for leaving them alone:
http://www.cbc.ca/canada/calgary/story/2011/01/05/calgary-break-in-brave-kids-hide-call-911.html
Heh. I wanted to be an anthropologist, and oddly enough my daughter (knowing nothing about that) decided she wants to study archaeology when she was quite young. She’s stuck with it and will pour over the driest accounts of digs and findings whenever she gets a chance. My mum found a summer camp where kids work on an actual dig, and we want to save up to send her when she’s old enough (a couple years).
The camp is out of state for us. Maybe if I start working on her father now, we can talk him into it by then? Heh. I should start collecting stories of kids who make awesome discoveries, to help up make our case.
That’s a great article. Let kids flourish and see what they can do!
Awesome article! Just shared it with my son’s 4th grade teacher. Maybe she’ll share it with her class.
I wanted to be an archeologist too, by the way. While all the other girls were interested in looking like Charlie’s Angels, I wanted to be like Mary Leakey : ) I knew I liked you!
Very cool! The Lascaux cave paintings in France were discovered by four teenagers–I think they were 17 or 18, so not little kids, but still a pretty big deal. I mean, 17, and no helmet or chaperone? Not bad.
Here’s another great story about what kids are capable of:
http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/metropolitan/7369979.html?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+houstonchronicle%2Fmetro+%28chron.com+-+Houston+%26+Texas%29&utm_content=Google+Feedfetcher
How cool! To think that young children can find such special stuff all on their own! Thanks for passing on the article.