History Main / ChildrenAreSpecial

* A somewhat twisted version in the ''Literature/KnightAndRogueSeries''. In general humans are the only species without magic, only having weak abilities like vague senses, but there are some children who can use magic. Children only, becuase only simple children can use magic, and between their powers and their mentail impairments and whatever other health problems come with they never last to adulthood.

* In ''WesternAnimation/DiGataDefenders'', in the episode the lost children,a man known as the Professor, is searching in a mine for evidence that Ra Dosians are descendants of interstellar travellers. But in the mines is a virus that is deadly to adults, but children are immune to the virus. So the Professor kidnaps children and forces them to work in the mines.

* In
''WesternAnimation/DiGataDefenders'',In the episode the lost
children,a man known as the Professor,is searching in a mine for evidence that Ra Dosians are descendants of interstellar travellers. But in the mines is a virus that is deadly to adults, but children are immune to the virus.So the Professor kidnaps children and forces them to work in the mines.

* In Creator/DevonMonk's ''[[Literature/AgeOfSteam Dead Iron]]'', [=LeFel=] abducted a four-year-old to act as his dreamer.

* The short story ''Mimsy Were the Borogoves'' by Lewis Padgett (a pseudonym of Henry Kuttner and C. L. Moore) starts with a post-scientist in the far future testing a TimeMachine by sending two boxes of toys into the past; he loses them, and considers the test a failure. The first box is discovered in the 20th Century, by the two child protagonists of the story, who by playing with them, quickly grow smarter. Their parents and other adults cannot comprehend the odd toys, because only a child's mind and way of thinking can comprehend them. Elsewhere (and, else-when) the second box is found in the 19th Century by young Alice Liddel. She can only barely understand the written material, being in her teenage years, but when describing it to her friend Charles Dodgson (better known today as Lewis Carroll) he finds it interesting and says he'll include them in one of his works. In the main story, the two siblings not only figure out the scientist's original experiment, but why it failed, and construct a device to leave the mortal world. A copy of ''Literature/ThroughTheLookingGlass'' is discovered by their parents, the odd title of the story (a line from ''Jabberwocky'' the missing piece used to complete the time-space equation.

* OlderThanFeudalism: In ''Literature/TheBible'', {{Jesus}} tells the disciples not to turn away a group of parents hoping to have their children blessed by him because one cannot enter to the kingdom of heaven without being like a child... [[WildMassGuessing whatever that's supposed to mean]].

Children Are Special, no doubt due to their [[ChildrenAreInnocent innocence and naïveté]], their purity of heart, or something along those lines. Also, life tends to get really depressing when [[ChildlessDystopia they're not around anymore]]. This is a trope which has been utilised all over the place for centuries. It possibly has its origins in old folklore and legends. Occasionally, children's specialty is [[PoweredByAForsakenChild what makes them being exploited in the first place]].

Children Are Special, no doubt due to their [[ChildrenAreInnocent innocence and naïveté]], their purity of heart, or something along those lines. Also, life tends to get really depressing when [[ChildlessDystopia they're not around anymore]]. This is a trope which has been utilised all over the place for centuries. It possibly has its origins in old folklore and legends.

[[folder:Film]]

* In ''Film/DontLookUnderTheBed'', only small children can see Larry (an imaginary friend) and understand the "temtrafuge" technology that rapidly ages boogeymen, thus making them harmless.

* In ''Film/ThePolarExpress'', only children (and only children who Believe, mind you) can hear Santa's bells. When they stop believing or turn into an "adult," they stop hearing the bells, except for those few lucky enough to actually ''see'' the North Pole. The protagonist still hears the bells when he's an adult because he actually has the experience to remember while other children just have the memory of the belief. More likely it's an exception to the rule, while still suiting this trope.

* In DontLookUnderTheBed, only small children can see Larry (an imaginary friend) and understand the "temtrafuge" technology that rapidly ages boogeymen, thus making them harmless.

* ''ChroniclesOfNarnia'': Susan becomes too "sophisticated" and "grown-up" for such childish things as Narnia. Peter, who is older, doesn't lose his "childish" belief. Because of that, Susan never returns to Narnia, even in the end; Peter does, even though he's an adult.

* A somewhat twisted version in the ''KnightAndRogueSeries''. In general humans are the only species without magic, only having weak abilities like vague senses, but there are some children who can use magic. Children only, becuase only simple children can use magic, and between their powers and their mentail impairments and whatever other health problems come with they never last to adulthood.

* The short story ''Mimsy Were the Borogoves'' starts with a post-scientist in the far future testing a TimeMachine by sending two boxes of toys into the past; he loses them, and considers the test a failure. The first box is discovered in the 20th Century, by the two child protagonists of the story, who by playing with them, quickly grow smarter. Their parents and other adults cannot comprehend the odd toys, because only a child's mind and way of thinking can comprehend them. Elsewhere (and, else-when) the second box is found in the 19th Century by young Alice Liddel. She can only barely understand the written material, being in her teenage years, but when describing it to her friend Charles Dodgson (better known today as Lewis Carroll) he finds it interesting and says he'll include them in one of his works. In the main story, the two siblings not only figure out the scientist's original experiment, but why it failed, and construct a device to leave the mortal world. A copy of ''Literature/ThroughTheLookingGlass'' is discovered by their parents, the odd title of the story (a line from ''Jabberwocky'' the missing piece used to complete the time-space equation.

* "Literature/InheritanceCycle" contains a brief mention that Elven children are incredibly powerful and their ability to wield magic slowly wanes as they grow into adulthood, finally settling down into a more normal (for Elves) level of power.

* "Literature/Inheritance Cycle" contains a brief mention that Elven children are incredibly powerful and their ability to wield magic slowly wanes as they grow into adulthood, finally settling down into a more normal (for Elves) level of power.

* In DevonMonk's ''[[Literature/AgeOfSteam Dead Iron]]'', [=LeFel=] abducted a four-year-old to act as his dreamer.

-->-- '''Matthew 11:25'''

* ''SerialExperimentsLain'' has a bizarre subversion of this, with a scientist harnessing the ESP of thousands upon thousands of children in an attempt to digitise reality. The children didn't get the better part of that deal.

* In ''ThePolarExpress'', only children (and only children who Believe, mind you) can hear Santa's bells. When they stop believing or turn into an "adult," they stop hearing the bells, except for those few lucky enough to actually ''see'' the North Pole. The protagonist still hears the bells when he's an adult because he actually has the experience to remember while other children just have the memory of the belief. More likely it's an exception to the rule, while still suiting this trope.

* Creator/StephenKing's novels often make a point about how children are better suited to dealing with the supernatural - they can accept it easier than most adults, due to a grown-up's mind being set in the ways about the nature of the 'real world'. Additionally, the titular monster of ''{{IT}}'' claims that only children can use the power of belief and Chud to stop it. The grown-up protagonists prove it wrong, but this may be to do with the fact that they had defeated it once as children already.

* ''EndersGame'' is probably somewhat of a subversion. If a child's trained from a young age in Battle School, then they can become as good a commander as an adult, and can learn how to understand the Buggers-- [[spoiler:but someone who really understood the buggers couldn't slaughter them, and so the commander needed to be tricked into thinking that the battles against the buggers were a simulation, not real combat with real casualties. Children were selected because they'd be naive enough not to suspect the battles were real]]. Which means that yes, children have the trait needed, but it's not necessarily a positive one.

* ''QuantumLeap'': Children, animals, and the mentally handicapped are the only ones who can see Al. [[HandWave Explained]] as Alpha brain waves or something which alters as one grows up, unless one is an animal or mentally handicapped.

* In ''The FairlyOddParents'', children are the only humans who get [[FairyCompanion fairy godparents]].

* The little girls in Zilpha Keatley Snyder's ''The Changeling'' believe that "babies are born knowing all sorts of magic stuff, until they start thinking separately and forget everything." They rely on a baby sister as a kind of [[ChildMage oracle/talisman]]. Snyder's subsequent ''{{Green-Sky}}'' fantasy trilogy builds on this idea, then inverts it: infants have ESP but the fact that powers are lost with maturity isn't a cute bit of Wordsworthian nostalgia but a symptom of what's literally wrecking the culture.

* Played very darkly in Issue #7 of ''TheSecretWorld,'' where it's revealed that the [[MegaCorp Orochi Group]] scientist [[MadScientist Doctor Schreber]] is a firm believer in this trope... hence the reason why his test subjects are almost exclusively children. Reasoning that children are more adaptable than adaults - even citing an incident when his four-year-old granddaughter taught him how to to use a new function on his smartphone - he goes so far as to test [[spoiler: the effects of demonic possession, mutant spores, ghosts, lycanthropy, and even the Filth]] on them. And terrifyingly enough, this approach garners results: [[spoiler: it turns out that the only reason why werewolves transform into their traditional form is because, as adults, they're under the subconscious influence of milennia worth of folklore and genetic memory. The children that Schreber went to the trouble of infecting with lycanthropy weren't old enough to be influenced, so their transformations are much more varied - hence the boss battle with the child-creature earlier in the issue.]]

Children Are Special, no doubt due to their [[ChildrenAreInnocent innocence and naïveté]], their purity of heart, or something along those lines. Also, life tends to get really depressing when [[ChildlessDystopia they're not around anymore]]. This is a trope which has been utilised [[SeenItAMillionTimes all over the place]] for centuries. It possibly has its origins in old folklore and legends.

* Played very darkly in Issue #7 ''TheSecretWorld,'' where it's revealed that the [[MegaCorp Orochi Group]] scientist [[MadScientist Doctor Schreber]] is a firm believer in this trope... hence the reason why his test subjects are almost exclusively children. Reasoning that children are more adaptable than adaults - even citing an incident when his four-year-old granddaughter taught him how to to use a new function on his smart - he goes so far as to test [[spoiler: the effects of demonic possession, mutant spores, ghosts, lycanthropy, and even the Filth]] on them. And terrifyingly enough, this approach garners results: [[spoiler: it turns out that the only reason why werewolves transform into their traditional form is because, as adults, they're under the subconscious influence of milennia worth of folklore and genetic memory. The children that Schreber went to the trouble of infecting with lycanthropy weren't old enough to be influenced, so their transformations are much more varied - hence the boss battle with the child-creature earlier in the issue.]]

Children Are Special, no doubt due to their [[ChildrenAreInnocent innocence and naïveté]], their purity of heart, or something along those lines. Also, life tends to get really depressing when [[ChildlessDystopia they're not around anymore]]. This is trope which has been utilised [[SeenItAMillionTimes all over the place]] for centuries. It possibly has its origins in old folklore and legends.

Often in fiction, the "special nature" of children will be utilised to explain why only they are capable of certain things. Only children can see fairies, demons, angels or the monster under the bed. Only children are capable of accessing the dream world. Only children are capable of certain talents or abilities. Only children are immune to the killer virus that's rampaging across the planet, etc. This is often a companion to GrowingUpSucks.