Recently, my wife and I got in the habit of doing a little ten minute lesson with our four year old son most evenings, usually after bath time. Sometimes, my wife teaches him how to write his name or I work with him on dinosaurs or outline Texas or repeat the pledge of allegiance or some other typical stuff. Last night, I pulled out a place-mat with pictures and names of the US Presidents. The lesson was going as well as could be expected. He could tell me the name of the first president and the current president and we counted all 44 of them. Then, I asked him if there was any president he wanted me to tell him about. His mom suggested Abraham Lincoln and I was pulling for Ronald Reagan. No. Not my son. The fun began when he pointed to …Richard Milhous Nixon. So, I attempted to explain how Mr. Nixon ended Vietnam and got in trouble for Watergate and resigned and then Gerald Ford became President. I knew the intricacies of the scandal and such was too ridiculously complicated to explain to most adults, let alone a Thomas the Tank Engine obsessed preschooler, so I left it at that. He didn’t. Before bed, he was pushing around a toy motorcycle, shouting from the rooftops how “Richard Mix’n” was riding his motorcycle and crashed into the water gate and water spilled everywhere and God told him to “Be careful” and he rode over to see Barack Obama. Have a nice day, Prof
