Wonder: Three Questions for Tonight

Welcome to Pass the Potatoes, where every week I hand you three questions for the dinner table, built around one book, movie, or headline. No homework, no worksheet. Just better conversation than “how was school?” “Fine.”

This week: Wonder by R. J. Palacio. Auggie Pullman was born with a facial difference and has been homeschooled his whole life. Now he’s starting fifth grade at a real school, with real kids, and real staring.

You don’t need to have read it. Your kid may have read it in class, or you can watch the movie together this weekend and talk about it over pizza.

Works for: ages 8 and up

1. Who in the story was brave, and was it the person you expected?

Most kids will say Auggie, and they’re right. But push a little. Being brave isn’t only walking into a scary place. Sometimes it’s sitting with the new kid when everyone’s watching you do it.

If they want to go deeper: “What’s something brave you saw someone do at school, even something small?”

2. Have you ever been on the outside of a group? What did you wish someone would do?

This one might get a shrug first. Wait it out. Silence at the dinner table is not failure. It’s thinking.

If they want to go deeper: “Is there anyone at your school right now who might feel that way?”

3. Is it more important to be right or to be kind? Can you think of a time those were different?

This is the big one. One of Auggie’s teachers builds a lesson around it, and it’s a question adults still haven’t figured out. Let your kid argue both sides. Let them argue with you.

If they shrug at everything

Ask them to tell you about the funniest part instead. Conversation is a door, not an interrogation. Once it’s open, the bigger questions tend to walk through on their own.

Pass the potatoes. Pass it on.