I have recently taught the girls how to check the temperature on my iPhone, hoping to reduce arguments from Babs about when a winter coat was necessary.
One morning they determined it was 31 degrees, which I told them was cold, and certainly coat weather.
Later that afternoon, Kiddo announced to me, "I think your phone is wrong."
I asked for more details.
"My friend told me that it was 29 degrees this morning, so I think your phone is wrong."
I really didn't know where to start. That the difference between 29 and 31 is trivial, and could be from time or place of measurement, but would not actually influence whether or not she needed a coat? No, there was a bigger problem.
"So, you're telling me that you believe your 8 year old friend over the weather channel, that is run by people who have studied for years about how to understand weather?"
"Yeah,"
I didn't want to teach her to distrust her friends, but the more my brain caught up with the situation, the more I was less irritated and more desperate.
"There will be times that you hear things at school that don't match what we you know from home," I told her. "First, I want you to talk to me about it. Second, you should always assume what you learned at home is true, until we can figure it out."
I hope she was listening.
