Choosing Ten Billion
There is a moment most parents know well. Your child is overwhelmed, confused, facing something new, and every instinct in you rises up and says: I’ll handle it, I’ll make this easier, I’ll fix it.
Recently, I spoke with a friend who was navigating a big life transition with her daughter. There were decisions to be made, logistics to figure out, and questions her daughter didn’t fully understand––and some her Mom didn’t know either. My friend was worried and said “I just want to protect her.” As she shared her concerns I asked, “What does your daughter get to decide?” Then there was a long pause and she said “Oh, I’m not sure. I didn’t think about that.”
Because we love our children deeply, we want to smooth the path, remove friction, and shield them from stress. But sometimes, in protecting them, we accidentally remove something they crave even more than comfort: Participation. Voice. Agency.
Children have very little control over their lives. Adults choose where they live, where they go to school, what their days look like, even what they eat or sometimes what they wear. When big shifts happen, that lack of control becomes even more visible. What many children long for isn’t control over everything. It’s inclusion, it’s being trusted to be part of the decision, it’s knowing they are heard.
This week, I saw this same truth play out in a very different way––through the eyes of one of our youngest learners. He is four. Coming to Acton and leaving the arms of his parents is still sometimes hard. Even though he enjoys school and has earned badges, it is still unfamiliar. What he desires most right now is control. He knows how to do the work but this week he needed something else first. He needed the agency to say no. He needed the space to wait, to observe, to choose to not participate––without shame. He needed to know that saying “not yet” didn’t mean exclusion, it meant that invitations would still come again.
At the end of morning work time, I asked him if he thought he might work the next day or make the same choice. He looked at me very seriously and said, “I’m going to be sick again tomorrow.” It was his way of reclaiming power.
I found his psychic super power fascinating and after he confessed that he really didn’t know if it would rain tomorrow or not we played his favorite game, Would You Rather. Choice by choice his energy shifted. “Would you rather eat lunch or play outside?” “Would you rather do Math or Writing?” He shared, “Ten billion numbers can go on forever and that’s way more exciting than lowercase letters!”
Simple choices opened him up because agency opens a world for a child. Knowing you can say no without shame, knowing your voice matters, knowing you are trusted to choose creates belonging. At Acton, this belief shapes everything we do. We value and trust learners. We do not make decisions for them simply because we can. We invite them into responsibility whether they are 4 or 14. Yes, sometimes that means a learner makes a poor choice. But that learning is theirs, it is not ours to steal from them in an effort to save them.
When a learner chooses to revise their work rather than being forced to, that is agency. When a group of learners plans an Exhibition and divides roles, that is agency. When a four year old decides ten billion is more exciting than lowercase letters, that is agency. Agency shapes identity.
Perhaps the question for us parents isn’t just, How do I help my child?
Maybe it is: Where does my child get to decide? Where am I protecting when I could be inviting? What small choices could open a larger sense of ownership? Where in my own life am I craving agency?
Children do not need control over everything but they do need to feel included in their own lives. At Acton, we believe that when children are trusted with real choices and real responsibility, they rise to meet it. Sometimes it starts with something as simple as choosing ten billion.