Fostering curiosity in kids (and their parents) since 2011

Posts from the ‘Questions’ category

On an average day, my daughter’s question-to-declarative sentence ratio clocks in at a healthy 5:1. In this section of the blog, I explore what happens when instead of saying “I don’t know,” I say “Let’s find out!”

Throwback Thursday: “Are caterpillars ticklish?” Part Two: The Tickling

Every once in a while people ask me why I named my blog Caterpickles. Believe it or not, there is actually a reason. Back in the days when my daughter’s question-to-declarative sentence ratio was a hefty 15:1, she asked me a question about caterpillars that launched an impromptu science experiment that was so much fun, I decided to document it (and a few of my daughter’s other questions) for posterity. “Mommyo, are caterpillars ticklish?”

Caterpickles cleans house, Part 4

Taking the summer off from answering questions on the blog would have worked a lot better if I’d established a Caterpickles Agreement with my daughter that she would take a summer off from asking them. I did not, alas, so now it’s time to catch up by answering several short questions about the history of tape, whether fire truck sirens are taped, and the relative heights of David and Goliath.

“Why did California ban paper money in 1850?”

While researching the question of whether miners would have actually bought supplies with gold dust anywhere other than on a Hollywood movie set, I discovered a surprising fact. When California became a state in 1850, its first state constitution explicitly banned the use of paper money. Now, why would California do a thing like that?

“How did Yukon Gold potatoes get their name?”

This week I learned that miners during the Klondike Gold Rush of 1896-99 (aka the Yukon Gold Rush) valued potatoes so highly for their scurvy-fighting powers that they paid for them in gold. Naturally that little tidbit made me wonder if that was how the Yukon Gold potato got its name. Eh, not exactly. At least, not directly.