Why Kids Need More Weird in Their Day
Updated: 4 days ago
What if a flower talked back? What if birds ran a delivery service? What if you discovered an octopus has three hearts?
Kids live in a world where adults spend a lot of time explaining how things are supposed to work.
Sit here.
Finish this.
Follow the instructions.
Choose the right answer.
Those things have their place.
But I think children need something else in their day, too.
They need weird.
Not weird for the sake of being silly. Weird because the unexpected makes us stop, wonder, question, imagine, and look again.
And those are wonderful things for a growing mind to do.
Weird Starts With a Question
One of my favorite kinds of questions is:
“Wait... WHAT?”
An octopus has three hearts?
Some birds deliver messages?
A tiny insect can do that?
Those little moments of surprise can open the door to curiosity.
A child who wasn't particularly interested in learning about octopuses might suddenly have ten questions after discovering the three-heart fact.
Why three?
Do all three beat at the same time?
What happens when it swims?
Do other animals have more than one heart?
One strange fact has suddenly become an invitation to explore.
That is the idea behind Earth Is Weird!, a short-form series I created around the wonderfully strange things that already exist on our planet.
No fantasy required.
Earth has been writing weird stories for billions of years.
But Sometimes We Should Invent the Weird
Then there is another kind of weird.
The impossible kind.
What if you walked through a meadow and accidentally became the leader of a bug parade?
What if flowers could hear you?
And worse...
What if they answered?
That is the territory of Weird Things I Found in OteoLand.
OteoLand permits me to take an ordinary idea, twist the knob three turns past normal, and ask a child:
“What do YOU think happens next?”
There doesn't always have to be one correct answer.
Maybe the purple flower is named Picklepuff.
Maybe it sneezes glitter.
Maybe it gets extremely offended when someone calls it a tulip.
Maybe your child invents something far stranger than anything I could have imagined.
Perfect.
Because now the child isn't simply consuming the story.
They're participating in it.
Imagination Isn't Just Entertainment
When children invent a creature, change the ending of a story, name something that doesn't exist, or explain an impossible event, they are playing with ideas.
They are making connections.
They are experimenting with language.
They are solving tiny creative problems.
They are asking:
“What if?”
We often associate learning with finding the correct answer.
Imagination asks children to do something different:
Create an answer that wasn't there before.
Both abilities matter.
Weird Can Make the Real World More Interesting, Too
This is one reason I like having both Earth and OteoLand in the stories I create.
On Earth, the weirdness is real.
In OteoLand, we make it up.
And somewhere between the two, something interesting happens.
A child might discover that an octopus really has three hearts and then wonder:
“What kind of creature would need FOUR?”
Now science has bumped into imagination.
That collision is exactly where I want these stories to live.
🔬 Discover something real.
đź’ Ask something impossible.
✨ Invent something new.
Learning doesn't always need to announce itself with a worksheet.
Sometimes it can sneak in wearing three hearts and riding in a bug parade.
Permit Kids to Be Ridiculous
Adults are very good at correcting things.
Children are very good at transforming them.
A cardboard box becomes a spaceship.
A spoon becomes a microphone.
The floor becomes lava, naturally.
And a strange flower becomes a character with a name, personality, favorite food, and possibly strong opinions about gardening.
Before saying:
“That doesn't make sense.”
Try asking:
“Okay... then what happens?”
Those four words can keep an imaginary world alive.
They tell a child that their idea is worth exploring.
And sometimes that is all an imagination needs to keep going.
A Little More Weird, Please
I don't think every moment of a child's day needs to be educational.
And I don't think every story needs to teach an obvious lesson.
Sometimes curiosity itself is enough.
Laugh at something absurd.
Discover something unbelievable.
Invent something impossible.
Ask a question nobody in the room knows how to answer.
Then go looking for the answer together.
Or, occasionally, make one up.
Because childhood already comes with an extraordinary ability to look at an ordinary world and see something else hiding inside it.
We should give that ability room to grow.
So yes...
I think kids need more weird in their day.
Fortunately, Earth has plenty.
And when Earth runs out, there's always OteoLand.
Keep wondering. Keep imagining. Keep things a little weird. 🌎✨
🌸 Now It's Your Turn to Make OteoLand Weird
In OteoLand, even the flowers have personalities.
Some of them talk back.
And one of them still needs a name.
Ask your young explorer:
What would YOU name a talking flower?
There are no vocabulary lists to choose from and no correct answers. Invent something funny, beautiful, ridiculous, mysterious, or completely new.
Then send us your idea.
Your young explorer's imagination might just help something new grow in OteoLand. 🌱✨
🌼 Name an OteoLand Flower
SUBMIT A FLOWER NAME → https://www.mayrariostheauthor.com/general-8
Two worlds. Two kinds of weird.
On Earth, Oteo explores the incredible things that are actually real. In OteoLand, Max explores the impossible things imagination can create. Here's how the two worlds connect:
🔎 Related Content
Want to keep the weird going? Explore both sides of the idea: the strange things that really exist on Earth and the impossible things waiting inside OteoLand.
🌎 Earth Is Weird!
Octopuses with three hearts are only the beginning.
Earth Is Weird! explores surprising animals, nature, space, weather, oceans, science, and other real things that make you stop and ask:
“Wait... that's REAL?!”
EXPLORE EARTH IS WEIRD! →https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLZNVnw_d4pmk
✨ Weird Things I Found in OteoLand
Now leave reality behind.
Flowers talk back. Birds have delivery routes. Tiny creatures hold parades. And those are just the things we've discovered so far.
Weird Things I Found in OteoLand is a growing collection of strange discoveries designed to invite kids to imagine what might be hiding just beyond the next corner.
EXPLORE WEIRD THINGS I FOUND IN OTEOLAND →https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLFzr-qSKXeQ0
Two Worlds. Two Kinds of Weird. One Big Question.
What will your child wonder about next?
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