{"id":20100,"date":"2026-03-11T08:47:55","date_gmt":"2026-03-11T08:47:55","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/gpbookstore.org\/articles\/uncategorized\/operation-tadpole-a-valuable-parenting-lesson-learned\/"},"modified":"2026-04-10T06:09:13","modified_gmt":"2026-04-10T06:09:13","slug":"operation-tadpole-a-valuable-parenting-lesson-learned","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/gpbookstore.org\/articles\/positive-living\/friends-and-family\/parenting\/operation-tadpole-a-valuable-parenting-lesson-learned\/","title":{"rendered":"Operation Tadpole: A Valuable Parenting Lesson Learned"},"content":{"rendered":"

I was washing dishes one day last May when my youngest, 11-year-old Nathan, came running into the house.<\/p>\n

\u201cMom, you won\u2019t believe what I found in the mud puddle. Come see!\u201d<\/p>\n

We were two months into pandemic lockdown<\/a> by that point, and remote learning hadn\u2019t been holding Nathan\u2019s interest. I was glad to hear him excited about something.<\/p>\n

I dried my hands and followed him to a large puddle in our driveway. \u201cThey\u2019re tadpoles!\u201d he said. \u201cDad said a frog must have laid her eggs in there.\u201d<\/p>\n

I bent down for a closer look. There were hundreds of tadpoles swimming around.<\/p>\n

\u201cAren\u2019t they cool?\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

The next few days, Nathan kept his eye on the tadpoles. One afternoon he asked if he could use my phone to check the weather. \u201cThe puddle is drying up, and it\u2019s not supposed to rain this week,\u201d he said. \u201cWe have to do something or the tadpoles will die.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cWhat can we do?\u201d I asked, hesitant about where this might lead.<\/p>\n

\u201cOperation Tadpole. I\u2019m going to move them into the pond where they\u2019ll be safe.\u201d He grabbed a bucket and headed outside. Within a few minutes, he was back. \u201cMom, the bucket is too big. There\u2019s not enough water and I\u2019m just scooping up mud.\u201d<\/p>\n

I handed him a red plastic cup<\/a>. \u201cThis should work.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cCan you help? There are so many tadpoles.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cI have things to do\u2026\u201d I started to say, but the look on Nathan\u2019s face stopped me. This was important to him. I grabbed another cup and followed him.<\/p>\n

We scooped up water and tadpoles, walked over to the other side of our property and emptied the cups into the pond. After just a few trips, the puddle was almost out of water but still very full of tadpoles.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhat are we going to do, Mom? We have to get them all out!\u201d<\/p>\n

I went back inside and grabbed two plastic spoons. We sat next to the puddle, caught the tadpoles with the spoons and put them in the plastic cups. When the cups were full, we transferred the tadpoles into the pond.<\/p>\n

After two hours, there were still dozens of tadpoles to be rescued. I was hot and tired.<\/p>\n

Then a fish in the pond swallowed several of the tadpoles. I cringed, hoping Nathan hadn\u2019t noticed. Too late.<\/p>\n

\u201cI thought they\u2019d be safe here,\u201d he said, fighting tears. I tried to explain that things like that happen in nature, but he wouldn\u2019t listen. He ran back into the house and grabbed an old fishbowl. \u201cThe rest of the tadpoles are coming in the house,\u201d he announced. \u201cI\u2019ll put them back outside when they\u2019re bigger and won\u2019t get eaten.\u201d<\/p>\n

We used the spoons to scoop the remaining tadpoles into the fishbowl. How had Operation Tadpole ended with us getting 50 new pets? I wondered. \u201cThis is your project and you need to take care of them,\u201d I told Nathan.<\/p>\n

\u201cI will, Mom. I promise,\u201d Nathan said. I knew better. Their care would fall on me. Nathan was a sweet, thoughtful boy, but he had trouble following through. Whether it was finishing a chore or putting in the work at school, he dropped the ball more often than not.<\/p>\n

I first noticed it when he was in first grade. There was a bulletin board that showed each student\u2019s progress on their math tests. I was dismayed to see that Nathan still hadn\u2019t passed the first test, while most of his classmates had completed 10 or more. We started practicing his math facts each night, but he struggled to memorize them. The same thing happened with spelling. He would spell a word correctly, but less than a minute later, he\u2019d forget. He\u2019d shut down and refuse to keep at it. Then, of course, he\u2019d fall behind.<\/p>\n

Nathan\u2019s learning issues had improved a lot since then, but he still needed more help than his siblings had at the same age. He would be starting middle school in the fall, and I wasn\u2019t sure how he would handle the change, especially after being out of school for so long because of the pandemic. We\u2019d done our best with at-home learning<\/a>, but it wasn\u2019t ideal.<\/p>\n

The next morning at breakfast, my husband, Eric, peered into the fishbowl and said, \u201cI wonder why some of the tadpoles are black and some are brown with orange spots.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"\"
\u00a0 \u00a0Diane, Nathan and Eric Stark<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

\u201cThe black ones are American toad tadpoles and the brown ones with the spots are Eastern spadefoot tadpoles,\u201d Nathan said.<\/p>\n

\u201cHow do you know that?\u201d Eric asked.<\/p>\n

\u201cLast night I looked on the Department of Natural Resources website. It has a list of the frogs and toads that live in Indiana. It describes what each species looks like when they\u2019re tadpoles, so I just matched them up,\u201d Nathan explained.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhat else did you learn?\u201d I asked.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe Eastern spadefoots will probably change into toads sooner. Their metamorphosis period is between two and nine weeks. The American toads change between six and ten weeks,\u201d Nathan said matter-of-factly.<\/p>\n

Eric and I exchanged a look. How did he remember all those details?<\/p>\n

Three weeks later, in mid-June, Nathan burst into my bedroom. \u201cThe tadpoles have legs!\u201d<\/p>\n

I rushed downstairs. Three of the brown tadpoles had back legs. A week later, they\u2019d grown front legs. I found Nathan rooting through the plastic containers in the kitchen. \u201cI\u2019ve got to get the toadlets out of the fishbowl before they drown,\u201d he said. \u201cTadpoles have gills, but toadlets have lungs.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cI didn\u2019t know that,\u201d I said.<\/p>\n

We found a suitable container. Nathan set up a second habitat with rocks for the toadlets to sit on so they could breathe. I watched him, impressed by his focus. It occurred to me that I\u2019d only had to remind him to feed the tadpoles once that week.<\/p>\n

\u201cI love these taddies,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

I smiled. \u201cYou\u2019re doing a great job caring for them.\u201d<\/p>\n

Over the next several weeks, more of the tadpoles grew their legs and then lost their tails. One afternoon, Nathan and I carried the toad habitat down to the pond and released them next to the water.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m so glad we saved them,\u201d Nathan said.<\/p>\n

\u201cMe too,\u201d I said. \u201cIt\u2019s been fun, and I\u2019ve learned a lot from you<\/a>.\u201d<\/p>\n

Over the summer, Nathan and I watched the rest of the tadpoles transform one by one into toads. We released them by the pond. By late August, there were just two tadpoles left. Nathan named them George and Harry. We checked on them every day, but they weren\u2019t developing.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhat\u2019s taking them so long?\u201d I asked. \u201cAll of the others changed more than a month ago.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cEvery tadpole is different, Mom. They\u2019ll change when they\u2019re ready.\u201d<\/p>\n

Nathan started middle school as a hybrid learner. He attended in person two days each week and did at-home learning the other days. Our other kids had done fine with the transition to middle school, but academics had always been harder for Nathan. Would having seven teachers and more assignments overwhelm him? What if he didn\u2019t follow through and fell behind?<\/p>\n

Then one morning in late September, I checked on George and Harry, the two remaining tadpoles. Harry had back legs. Finally! I looked at George. Every tadpole will change when it\u2019s ready, I remembered. A lesson I would hold close<\/a> when it came to my son too.<\/p>\n

For inspiring animal-themed devotions, subscribe to\u00a0<\/em>All God’s Creatures<\/strong><\/u><\/a>\u00a0magazine.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I was washing dishes one day last May when my youngest, 11-year-old Nathan, came running into the house. \u201cMom, you won\u2019t believe what I found in the mud puddle. Come see!\u201d We were two months into pandemic lockdown by that point, and remote learning hadn\u2019t been holding Nathan\u2019s interest. I was glad to hear him […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":28,"featured_media":28721,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"ep_exclude_from_search":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[183],"tags":[317,34,177,178,64,213],"ppma_author":[742],"class_list":["post-20100","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-parenting","tag-all-creatures","tag-child","tag-coronavirus","tag-covid-inspiration","tag-nature","tag-son"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\nOperation Tadpole: A Valuable Parenting Lesson Learned - Guideposts Articles<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"noindex, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Operation Tadpole: A Valuable Parenting Lesson Learned\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"I was washing dishes one day last May when my youngest, 11-year-old Nathan, came running into the house. \u201cMom, you won\u2019t believe what I found in the mud puddle. 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