Aspirational Holiday Gifts

My grandfather believed in aspirational rather than age- appropriate gifts. Of all the holiday and birthday presents I received while growing up, the one I most vividly remember was the fountain pen and mechanical pencil set my grandfather gave me, when I was five. My initials even were embossed on both the pen and pencil in gold.

     What are some aspirational gifts that would inspire young people to learn more about the world? A globe is my favorite. It shows the world is round and countries are their correct relative sizes to each other, unlike on some two-dimensional maps, where Greenland is as big as Africa. Globes show the world has more than 200 countries, three oceans, and seven continents, one of which is frozen. A child can put a sticker on where he or she was born and lives.

     If a child already owns a globe, there is the Atlas of Animal Adventures that shows where animals live. Children can go from the book to the globe to find the country habitats of their favorite animals.

     Even in this digital age of email, children feel very grown up, when they receive mail. With a subscription to National Geographic Kids (shop.nationalgeographic.com/ category/magazines/national-geographic-kids), they receive a magazine nearly every month. Adults also will look forward to the world's fun facts, activities, photos, and games in each issue.

     Little Passports (littlepassports.com) is another way to give children mail every month. Each mailing provides activities, souvenirs, letters from fictional pen pals, and other fun ways to learn about a particular country.

     Presenting a child with a $25 kiva (kiva.org) gift card enables a child to loan someone in one of 80 countries the funds to improve a life. With the help of an older person, a child can scroll through the faces of people who need just a little help to plant a crop, open a store, or build something. And it is up to the child to decide where to offer his or her loan. They then receive email messages telling the amounts of every loan repayment.

     And finally, to advance a student's budding interest foreign languages or foreign travel, I'd suggest Other Wordly: Words Both Strange and Lovely From Around the World  by Yee-Lum Mak and illustrated by Kelsey Garrity-Riley and the series: The 500 Hidden Secrets of London, The 500 Hidden Secrets of Paris, and The 500 Hidden Secrets of Barcelona.

     None of these aspirational gifts will choke children under three (I hope), but they will give them a head start in feeling comfortable in the world where they will spend their lives.