Do children experience zeitgeist differently?

I really enjoy the Zeitgeist element of the episodes (even though they break my heart at times 😅), but as a middle-grade writer, I was wondering if children experience zeitgeist differently to adults and how we should think about that in relation to our writing.

I was thinking about this because my childhood felt noble bright, when the world was actually probably more grimdark, but my parents sheltered us from the brunt of it (military family in the UK in the early 2000s, amongst other things). Looking back, I probably wasn't living in the same turning externally and internally. Living in a high deprivation area, I don't think I even lived in the same turning as some of my classmates, which is also really interesting.

Do we shape our children's early experience of the turnings? Are there separate turnings even within families or within individuals as opposed to the wider culture? How do we reflect some of these things when writing for children who are starting to be more aware of the world, but don't have that experience and broader knowledge to more accurately interpret what they're starting to realise is happening around them? And how do we gently help them as they transition from (what one would hope is) the noble bright bubble of childhood into the reality of the wider world’s turnings?

Just asking/thinking more deeply about these things as

1. A middle grade writer and

2. A mother of a young one

Curious for all thoughts, but I think this could make an interesting zeitgeist section as well @Jonathan Shuerger and @Thomas Umstattd Jr. — especially since you guys have small people too. Though that makes me wonder if men/women or mothers/fathers respond differently to the turnings too…