At Least Her Future Is Bright

I work with preschoolers at a daycare. I have a little girl who is incredibly smart but also can have incredibly silly moments. It is the end of daylight saving time, and as such, it gets dark before some of the kids leave. I decide to use this as a teachable moment and talk about the sunset. I turn their attention to the outside and they notice that it’s dark. I ask them why, and they all look at me with blank stares. I explain to them that the sun went down — the sun set.

Girl: *Gasp* “We have to set the sun!”

I was so surprised, I didn’t know how to respond. I think I just said that the sun had already set, so we didn’t have to worry about it. We talked some more about how the earth turns, which is why we have day and night, and how the earth goes around the sun, which is why we have seasons and years. For the next week, some of those kids would come up to me and tell me, “The earth goes around the sun!” which made my teacher heart happy.