Having a sense of curiosity is integral for your child to learn. Nurturing your child’s sense of curiosity will cultivate their desire to learn. Studies have shown that a child’s curiosity motivates them to seek out new experiences and lead to greater success in school in the long run.
1. Don’t Always Answer Their Questions
If we always answer our children’s questions, it can begin to affect their ability to think things through for themselves.
They suggest that when kids ask questions, they have already got some thoughts about what the answer might be. It may be more supportive of their curiosity to instead answer a question by saying, “That’s a good question. What do YOU think?”
2. Read Together and Ask Questions Out Loud
This is a widely used teaching technique that models how kids can ask themselves questions as they read. When Onetime and I are reading a book together, I will often pause and comment on things that I wonder as we are reading.
For example, I might say some things like:
“Hmm…I wonder what will happen next?” “I wonder why that boy is doing that?” or
“I wonder where they are going?” or “I wonder who is going to help?”
Sometimes, I just pause and ask my son if he has any questions about what we’re reading. This is usually easier for kids to do when you’re reading non-fiction (real) texts.
3. Provide Open-Ended Activities
Let kids play! We’ve heard this over and over in the news lately. It’s so important not to structure every little thing that our kids do in the day.
Kids can learn just as much from exploratory play with new materials as they can from “lessons” and worksheets. Guided activities and paperwork have their place, but kids are really motivated to learn when they can get “hands-on” with materials.
Allowing kids to investigate the properties of different materials, ideally with you beside them to help them observe, definitely boosts creativity and curiosity – two very closely-related traits.
When kids are trying new ways to combine, order, and learn about new materials – they are asking themselves questions and testing their own hypotheses! Curiosity in action!
[Source: http://onetimethrough.com/5-ways-boost-childs-curiosity/]