Discussion How do I write in a child's POV

I'm currently writing a short story and my main character happens to be a 8 year-old-child. I don't have a lot of experience writing in a child's POV and I'm worried I would write them too mature, or too childish.

This story is pretty dark as it deals with death and grief and I'm worried I won't be able to write the child realistically. I tried keeping my writing as simple as possible to suit the child's character but it's been really tough. Any suggestions?

 

Death and grief? Well, my grandfather died when I was around that age. I didn't really feel sad at the time. It was in the days to come that I started to realize his absence in my daily life and it made me really sad.

That's all I remember really. I was too young.

 

You can take reference from this video.

 

Hmm, i can see that. My grandma passed away a few months ago and my little brothers didn't look or feel sad. and mostly in my story the one dealing with grief is the adults, the child is what they are mourning about. Basically he's dead

 

my youngest sister was 8 when our mom passed away, she didn't cry, not even once even though she's super close to our mom, it's just when her teacher asked our dad to remarry she said she just wanted our mom as mother, I don't know if it's because she couldn't understand death or else

 

this video reminded me of my younger self searching for those videos about kissing on my dad's ipad because that was the closest thing to porn when i was little

 

Use what you have learned of the perception of children in the eyes of humanity from osmosis.

It's like how some words sound sharp and others sound round. You may not have ever heard a word before, but you still know the meaning of it because of the way it sounds.

It's like how you know how a doctor talks, in that practiced reassuring way, and how a teacher acts, in that authoritative patient way, even though you may not know one closely.

Act on the essence of it rather than any specific example.

Humans perceive so much more than they realize, and you have so much more knowledge than you know.

Channel that energy/essence into words to create a character that feels real/alive.

I hope that made sense.

 

I’m not too sure, but I’ll say how I would do this. Different kids have different perspectives because of experience. A kid growing up in a war zone probably has a more mature perspective because they’ve been through a lot of stuff that expose the harsher truths of the world. Use this as a model.

Write down as many experiences and events that the character has lived through, and next to it write what the kid learned from it. Maybe the more trivial ones like touching fire bad are not necessary. You can then probably get an idea of how this fictional character would react to a situation using their “past experiences” just as normal people would. If the child has had a pretty standard life in the suburbs up until the point of grief, they should have a pretty naive world view.

It’s very difficult to say how any child will respond to grief, but if you use notes that sum up their experiences, you should be able to simulate their thoughts I would think. Some subtle things to keep in mind might be how the adults around them react. Kids are more sensitive to that stuff, as you can see quite easily in the example where a kid will calm down about an injury or other scary thing if their parents put on a calm demeanor.

Anyway that’s how I would approach it, and I feel like it would be a good start. I’m not sure how well it would work though. It can be hard sometimes to put yourself in someone else’s shoes, especially if that person is fictional.

 

Child POV + Dark stuffs...

Combining UwU + Maul's Hatred

 

I guess children don't really understand the concept of death. And with our parents always telling us about a better place in heaven and all that we really don't think of it as a bad thing.

You don't really miss that person when they die or during their funeral. Your memories with them are still fresh. It's only after a while that it starts to dawn on you what you've lost. Looking at the chair they used to sit in all the time and get emotional not knowing why. Seeing your mother throwing away a withered potted plant he used to take care of when he was alive immediately makes you defensive even though it doesn't make sense. You really start to get desperate to keep them alive. You know what I mean? Its hard to explain.
For a long time it feels like there's something missing.