Pinocchio wants to be a real boy. How do you know that you’re real? What does it feel like to be real?

Maeve: “When you are real you can experience more feelings. Some of those feelings are: happy, sad, frustrated, scared, excited, and many more. You can feel bad and sad but being real is like a scale, bad and good measure perfectly. I know I am real because I experience all of these things.”

Max: “Maybe Pinocchio is a real boy and all of us are not real…Well, if you’re a human you might not be real but if you’re human you can have emotions, you are vulnerable to sharp things and you can walk and talk.”

Mia: “You know you are real if you have emotions.”

Ava: “I think that when you are real your heart is beating you have many moods, you’re not made out of wood, you can eat, you can talk.”

Thomas: “It feels good to be real. It feels good because you have senses that work. I feel like I’m real when I pull a planeswalker and the first idea that pops into my head is NEW IDEA.”

Sophia: “I am real because I do not have a nose that grows every time I tell a lie. I have skin and bones and I am not made out of wood. I am a human being. I like myself. I can be who I want, when I want.”

Ally: “I don’t know if I am real. I think I am real. I am real because I’m alive so is Pinocchio but he has a long nose that grows when he lies and our nose doesn’t do anything when we lie.”

Zoe: “ You can move. You can breathe and you have blood. You also have bones, skin and a heart. You also have a brain. It feels cool to be real. If you are real you don’t really think about what it feels when you are real. To be honest I don’t even know if I’m real.”

Andrei: “Something that makes me feel real is when I tap. Tapping makes me feel like I can do whatever I want.”

Charlie: “I know I am real because I am free to do what I want to do always. It feels like I am free. One time I feel most free is when I swish a three pointer and it also give me a lot of confidence.”

Pema: “A real boy is a living human. Pinocchio is kind of a real boy and kind of not. He is a boy because he is living and can do some things that boys do. I think when he wishes that he was a boy he actually means that he wishes that he could tell a lie. I know I am real because I am made not out of any materials. When you are real it is not that easy. You have to deal with real things. The difference between us and Pinocchio is he is carved and we are not. He cannot tell a lie, we can.”

Clarissa: It feels alive and exciting. It feels plain and ordinary to be fake. When you’re fake you feel insecure…When you’re real you feel secure in this world and you don’t feel like you are lying. When you’re fake you feel like you’re lying to people who think you are real.”

A note for students whose ideas are not included in this post, send me your thoughts on the subject and I will update the post.