Real?

I am listening to Alison Gopnik's "The Philosophical Baby" as an audiobook, and she is big on babies' imaginations. Luke illustrated the phenomenon handily this weekend, and more: You can see his fascination with the boundaries between real and pretend.

He was especially taken by all the wax statues at Fort Mackinac.








He was clearly puzzled by the statues so we exlained, "he's not a real man, he's just a statue." Every time we'd see another one he'd ask, "real man?" even though he seemed to know the answer already. It became a big game.

Occasionally when he tells me something make believe (for example when he asks for something specific to eat that doesn't sound totally implausible) I won't get that he's pretending. He can usually figure out that I'm confused so he'll quietly tell me "pretend, dada". Then we'll go along with the pretend snack or game etc.




POSTSCRIPT 6/29
Here is Luke's daily daycare report from today; note especially the last line