Knowing it versus experiencing it

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My oldest two kids just saw fireworks for the first time last night. They had never experienced them before and they spent quite a bit of time yesterday talking about going to see them and asking questions about them.

They knew they would be loud. They were told they were all kinds of colors. They even watched a video of what they looked like. They knew they would be in the sky. But, they really didn't know what it would be like. They both had ear protection because they were scared it was going to really be loud.

Once we got to the park it was quite a while waiting until finally, the first fireworks went off. I had no idea how they'd respond...

Their faces lit up with smiles and they just stared. I don't know if it was anywhere close to what they had imagined it would be like, but they now knew from experience what fireworks are really like.

We can know a lot anymore about stuff because of the access to information that is around us, but there's still something to actually going through the experience of the thing that brings us to a whole other level of learning than just knowing it in our heads.

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