Little helper
I came across an interesting passage on BabyCenter.com recently; it explained that kids (despite what some may think) are actually programmed to be helpful and cooperative. Researchers in 2006, read the piece, “discovered that toddlers as young as 18 months already have full-fledged qualities of altruism and cooperation. The way they demonstrated this was simple. A researcher would ‘struggle’ to hang up a towel with a clothespin or stack up a pile of books. When he dropped the clothespin or tipped the books over, the toddlers would race to pick up the clothespin and hand it back, or restack the books. But when the researcher made the same mistakes without struggling — that is, without looking like he needed help — the toddlers didn’t budge. They understood what it meant to be helpful.”
I couldn’t help but smile when I read this, as Zoe has exhibited helpful behavior for several months now. She routinely closes the refrigerator door for us, for example, and if a piece of laundry falls out of the washer on its way to the dryer she’ll bend down to pick it up for me. And the other morning, as we were leaving for Elena’s, Zoe said, “uh-oh!” and pointed from her perch in the backseat. She was, I quickly realized, alerting me to the fact that I’d forgotten to close the garage door. Thank you, Zoe!
-M