Polly Maly admits that she's never been a very political person, but she's about to be. The West Des Moines, Iowa, mother of two sees the coming election as the perfect teachable moment for her 10-year-old son Cole. The candidates are plastered across the news. Issues are popping up in regular conversation. "He's already asking all kinds of questions," Polly says.

Cole's interest was piqued last spring when he had to do a school project that involved interviewing a local politician and finding out about his job, how he got paid, and what he did for the community. But the project didn't focus on politics or the system behind it. Polly's going to take on that one herself. "I don't know if he understands political parties yet," she says, "but at 10 he can understand groups and taking sides and aligning with ideas. I thought this would be a great time to teach him the differences between the donkey and the elephant."

While Cole is learning about the elections, a group of 4th-graders at Brick Township's Veterans Memorial Elementary School in New Jersey has already discovered that they can do more than learn--they can make a difference.

"As we were studying facts about New Jersey, we learned that earlier state symbols had been suggested by children. We also learned that New Jersey, the Garden State, had no state fruit or vegetable," says Suzanne Kurasz, one of the kids' teachers. Soon the students were writing to their local assemblyman, nominating the blueberry as the state fruit. On their own time, the kids gathered signatures on petitions and obtained official endorsements of support from local organizations.