March 22, 2026: Helping Kids Grow Ideas

Ideas are seeds. A tiny speck or hint of something.

         Kids are filled with ideas. That is one of the most wonderful things about working with children.  They have not yet developed those gate-keeping impulses that we adults have, so their ideas just come pouring out.

         But they have also not yet learned how to take a promising idea and help it grow. That is where they need the support, guidance, and coaching of a good mentor.

         This month I had the privilege of helping two different groups of students nurture a promising idea into something wonderful.

         One was a pair of students who wanted to apply for one of our PTA’s Student Grants to turn their idea into reality.  They wanted to start a school tradition of building relationships between our Kindergarteners and our 5^th Graders.  They had the general idea, but had not yet worked out any of the details or strategic plans that would make their Buddy Day idea work.  All I had to do was ask them some questions regarding the specifics of their vision, give them some guidance about what was critical to include, and they were off and running.

         The second was a digital project started by a group of six 5^th Graders. They had an idea for a website where students could go to read stories. They ran with it and set up the website, but when they excitedly shared it, it was clear they had not fleshed out their idea.  It was not clear what the purpose or goal was, and while their technology-savvy skills helped to lay the groundwork for what had potential, it was unpolished, a tad confusing, and very rough.  As I sat with the students and began to ask them questions, their ideas seemed all over the place and did not have any cohesiveness, so we continued to chat. The more we talked, the more questions I asked them, the more they pondered their idea and its potential, the more clarity they seemed to find.  Once they had articulated their goal for this project, it was instantly clear to them, some of the mistakes they had made thus far.  We also had discussions about ethics and AI tools. I gave some suggestions for reorganizing and refocusing their pages.  I praised their idea as having great potential, but cautioned them that this was going to be a process. It was going to take time and effort to take this awesome idea, and grow it into what they wanted.

What great lessons all of these young people are learning.

That ideas are powerful.

To take an idea from a dream to reality takes effort and creativity.

That their ideas can positively impact their communities.