Petersuh-uh-uhn…. I need a white crayon for the white parts of the map!”, my daughter’s classmate whines as she peers into her box of mismatched Crayons. “Don’t worry about coloring those parts of the map. White isn’t a color anyways…”, replies her sixth grade teacher. Uh-oh. Big mistake! The entire class is now in for an impromptu lesson in the properties of light and the visible spectrum, courtesy of the child of a laser student. Added bonus: elevated egg-headed status for aforementioned child. “Excuse me, Mr. Petersen, but I feel that I must correct you on that. You are sadly misinformed. My Mom says that white is the presence of all color and black is no color! What of that?! Hmmm?” (Yes…my kid really talks like this. She’s 10 and she skipped a grade level. She’s quite loquacious. I wonder where she gets it from? But I digress…) The flustered Mr. Petersen flashes my child a weak smile and mumbles something to the effect of, ”…technically, Jacki, you are correct. Just leave the white parts blank and stay on task!” Shame, shame, shame. The instructor has just dropped the ball on a wide-open opportunity for learning and discussion. Never one to miss an opportunity to exercise her mind and initiate a discussion/impress her peers, my kid goes on to explain the basic principles and properties of light and color. This precipitates a wave of “no way!” and “how’d you know?”s from the inherently curious and doubly impressed group of sixth graders. As she, in fits and giggles (true sixth grade girl fashion!), recounted the story to me, she re-iterated over and over that “most grown ups just don’t know ANYTHING!”. And I thought to myself, “You know…we might know a lot about some things, but she just pointed out one of the most popular misconceptions that abounds concerning...
