The Things I Learn From My Students

I was tutoring one of my former third graders this morning. We were working on reading comprehension and application skills. He had just read a story about three different kinds of bears, and I was asking him to think about the story "Goldilocks and the Three Bears" and how it would change if we changed the type of bear in the story. We were discussing what would be different about the fairy tale if Goldilocks had stumbled upon the home of polar bears. My student named several differences, the weather, what Goldilocks might be wearing, what sort of "home" it might be that she stumbled upon...and then he said, "But the house would have electricity!"

"It would?" I inquired. "In the Arctic Circle?"

"That's the North Pole, right?" He confirmed. "Yep. Santa has electricity."

Well then, of course polar bears would have electricity in a fairy tale set at the North Pole. What on earth was I thinking?!