Kids and Tarot

Thread originally posted on the Aeclectic Tarot Forum on 06 Jan 2004, and now archived in the Forum Library.

miss_apples	06 Jan 2004
My 4 year old daughter has recently taken an interest in, not just my tarot cards but also my healing with the angels oracle cards. I allow her to play with them when I am able to supervise her. Now she hasnt read the actual tarot cards but she likes to line them up and pick out her favorite ones that she thinks are pretty. She can kinda read the angel cards though. Does anyone else let their youngins interact with the cards?

Vynara	06 Jan 2004
Wow. I wish my parents had let me play with tarot when I was that young :D

Majecot	06 Jan 2004
miss_apples Children are very preceptive, and they are very intuitive. have you asked her what she thinks of the cards? (besides being pretty) My granddaughter is 4 this month and, altho I haven't let her play with my cards, she is very intuitive about pictures and loves to tell me stories.. You should have her tell you a story about them, I would bet that you will be pleasantly surprised and her insight.

Tarotmyst	06 Jan 2004
I let my four year old daughter play with my cards too. At first she would go through them and make piles of the cards she did like, or the ones she didn't like, or sometimes even the ones i could have back! Recently i have started to just splay them out on my bed and sit with her while she chooses three cards and lays them out to tell a mini story of her choosing. She also likes to ask lots of questions about what the peoples' names are in each card or what they are doing and we make stories out of the answers together.

Emily	06 Jan 2004
My 6 year old son likes to look through my tarot cards, sometimes I ask him what he see's on the cards and he can tell me things that I've not noticed before. He's good at pointing things out. He likes most of my decks and always seems to show an interest. My husband isn't keen on me encouraging him though, my hubby doesn't understand or want to understand tarot - and doesn't want me to interest our son in it - but I can't stop him looking at the cards when I use them :D

miss_apples	06 Jan 2004
Quote: Originally posted by Emily My 6 year old son likes to look through my tarot cards, sometimes I ask him what he see's on the cards and he can tell me things that I've not noticed before. He's good at pointing things out. He likes most of my decks and always seems to show an interest. My husband isn't keen on me encouraging him though, my hubby doesn't understand or want to understand tarot - and doesn't want me to interest our son in it - but I can't stop him looking at the cards when I use them :D You should just tell your husband that you cant completly control what your son is going to interest himself in. If he is interested in the cards theres not much you can do to stop that interest anyways. Yeah my daughter likes to tell stories with the cards too. Shes only gotten to play with them a couple of times because I wont let her play with them when her little brother is around because he will surely wreck them. He is in that destructive stage. When she gets older I want to get her the halloween deck because she was born the night before halloween.

Star Spirit	06 Jan 2004
There have been a few threads on this recently. I also wish I could have been introduced at a young age, but as far as I know I'm the first to use tarot cards in the past few generations of my family, at least. I will definitely introduce them to my children someday, if they want to learn :D

sagitarian	06 Jan 2004
I let my children play with my cards as well. They usually pick it out, and ask me what it says, what it means, and I ask them in return "what do you think it means, tell me about it" then my oldest daughter (whose 4) usually just giggles and says "I don't know". But she has in the past given her interpretation (story) of cards in the past (with my healing with the faeries) and really likes them. When I pull my cards out and their around me, I let my kids pick out cards and allow them to play with the faeries on this level as well. I find nothing at all wrong with this, I think it's great. However, just be careful, make sure you explain to them that it's ok to talk about such things with certain people, to be careful who they talk to about tarot. Last thing you need is your 6 yr old child off at school telling the whole kindergarden class that mommy does tarot cards (and automatically being labeled nasty names by judgemental people). Food for thought for ya as a precautionary.

yagottabelieve	06 Jan 2004
my son is 9 and just got his first deck. he has always been fascinated with mine and i am letting him explore his in his own way and in his own time. my six year old loves to look at my faerie oracle deck (froud) and choose his favorites.

celeste	06 Jan 2004
There is a Sakura/anime deck that I have been thinking of buying for my daughter. She is familiar with the characters( from the tv show) and I think that would be a great way to introduce tarot at her level and interest. If she wants to continue on with it at a more sophisticated level later on then that's her choice.

miss_apples	06 Jan 2004
Im not worried about my child going and telling everyone about my reading of tarot, I mean...if people want to label me, thats their problem and not mine. Plus around here...people arent judgemental about it...they just see it as another hobbie like stamp collecting and crafts. Yagotta...has your son given you any readings?

yagottabelieve	06 Jan 2004
he hasn't yet. i am just letting him go through and see what he thinks of the images. it is very interesting the difference between what he sees and what i see. it is a deck that isn't a traditional tarot and i am not at all familiar with it. it's the egipcios kier (kaplan) we made a big day out of it and took a trip to new hope, pa to my favorite shop and he looked through all the decks and all the catalogs. he was very excited to pick out his own. he goes through phases of how interested he is. he's 9!

Emily	06 Jan 2004
I've told my son that my cards are like the cards he was using for speech therapy, pictures that tell a story :) - and he's told me a few good stories with the Universal Waite although he loves the colours of the Radiant. My reading the cards isn't really an issue between me and hubby - he's had hobbies that have cost him alot of money and haven't lasted - tarot doesn't cost me that much and is a very big part of my life, I'm not really bothered at all that it doesn't interest him and he knows better than to make my little hobby a problem between us. :) As for my son when he asks for a deck of his own then he'll get one.

WalesWoman	08 Jan 2004
I've got 8 year old twins and they are interested in my cards, they like matching the cards up with pictures in the accompaning book (Morgan-Greer) or matching those cards with the Radiant. I haven't encouraged or discouraged and try to keep my answers as simple as possible. If they ask about a particular card, I ask them first what they see, what they think it means and then explain what it means to me. I thought my daughters take on Morgan-Greers 5 Pentacles was really cool. She said, "It's love", and that's what I felt too when I first saw it, when I was brand new and all to the deck and Tarot, then I learned all the other meanings, but it still looks like love and compassion for another's pain and misfortune to me. Anyhow, I'm in no rush to get them their own deck. It would be lost in a week, when they are older and more responsible, more mature and a little more "in charge" of their own decisions and still have the interest and desire to learn more... my reasoning is I'd rather that they find their own way to find what is right for them. So I don't encourage or discourage for the most part the paths they take to find some spiritual enlightenment. We talk about many things, and try to be open minded, let them decide for themselves rather than having them spend a life time dealing with the results of child hool indoctrination into religious and spiritual beliefs and practices. Don't know if I'm on the right track or not here, but ... My older kids have found their own way, one son really likes the Faery Wicca, pays no attention to the book what so ever and throws Runes too. His 18 year old little brother is into oriental philosophies and practices, namely Tsao Chi (?), and I see he's been reading Crowley and going to on-line Thoth sites. Much more ambitious than his mother to be sure. I'm not sure what my oldest son is into, besides motor oil, engine grease and fishing boats. Don't have the heart to hearts we used to now that communication is long distance.

CreativeFire	09 Jan 2004
Have had tarot cards around my home since my son was a baby, so he has never really asked about them much - he is now 10. He just knows that they are my cards that I "play" with. He looks at them sometimes and comments on the different pictures which is always interesting to get the insight of the young. He recently asked me what the different symbols were - Cups, Wands, Swords, Pentacles and when I briefly explained that they sort of relate to the different elements of Water, Fire, Air, Earth - he made me laugh when he said that they are similar to his Yu-Gi-Ou cards - which are a bit of craze for young kids at the moment. It made me have a closer look at his cards then, and sure enough - they relate to elements and symbols and have different "powers" and meanings. Had a bigger chuckle when I overhead my son telling one of his friends (whilst they were playing with their Yu-Gi-Ou cards), that I have decks of cards which are like grown up Yu-Gi-Ou cards :-) and can tell stories with them. Makes me think that maybe tarot will not be such a "strange" thing for him when he is older - but that will be totally his choice when he asks. CreativeFire

lark	09 Jan 2004
Maybe you've got something there CreativeFire. Maybe Tarot started out long, long, ago as a childrens game and we grown ups just adopted it. They are so much more creative and open than we are.

The Kids and Tarot thread was originally posted on 06 Jan 2004 in the Talking Tarot board, and is now archived in the Forum Library. Read the active threads in Talking Tarot, or read more archived threads.