I have been a substitute for a while now, and I have had students ask me the craziest questions. I recently recalled a fun question I was asked by a group of students in Transitional Kindergarten (TK for short) when I first started subbing. I was asked a question that might offend some adults, but honestly made me laugh. One boy looked at me, and in front of everyone asked in a loud voice “how old are you?”
I honestly was not expecting that kind of question and it through me off for a minute. I was taught from a young age that you don’t ask adults how old they are. Since I’m still only 24 years old, I didn’t mind that kind of question. But I couldn’t just tell them how old I am, I was curious as to how old they assumed I was. So I asked them to guess how old I was, and the answer shocked me. “I think you’re 100 years old!”
Many of the students in the class are only 4 or 5 years old, so their idea of age is different from mine. Nevertheless, I was still taken aback that they guessed 100 years old. I think someone a little older would guess maybe 30 or 40, since I probably look like their mother’s age. But at 5 years old, they probably think that every adult is about 100 right?
Looking back on the incident, I think about the perception of age and how it changes over time. I remember thinking at 5 years old that being 25 is old. Now that 25 is less than a year away I think about how young I still am and how much more I want to do with life. Also, the older I get the more I realize that age really is just number. It also made me think about a video I watched for one of my psychology classes in college. It was a great video that asked different people what age they considered to be old, then they brought in people that age and they talked about how they feel being that age. I will put a link to the video at the bottom of this story. It was so inspiring and it really made me change my perception on age and what it means to be old.
When this group of TK students said they thought I was 100, I wasn’t even offended. They don’t understand age just yet and, honestly, I hope I live to be 100 some day. I answered them by saying I’m not 100, and that was followed with a barrage of different answer, and the number was not going down. “110! 120! NO 130!”
I told them I was much younger than 100, but I loved how excited they got guessing my age. They are so young and have so much to learn about life, and they are excited to learn! That was what made me happy when I reflected on that moment in my subbing career. They wanted to get to know me, learn about who I am, and even show me that they can count soooooooo high! Whether at 5, 24 or 130 years old, age really is a mind set. I wonder what they would’ve said if I told them I was 100?
Young and Confused 