Children are unpredictable.
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That is what Wagga High School year 9 student Rose Sadler has learnt over the past four weeks.
Two days a week, the 14-year-old and her 23 fellow child studies classmates have been running a free playgroup out of the high school hall.
Attended by up to 40 children aged under four, the high schooler admits, it leaves her fairly depleted afterwards.
"I want to be a teacher one day, so I thought this would help me connect better with kids," she said.
"I love kids, I love the way they're so playful and they don't care about the things you have to care about as you get older.
"But they're unpredictable, you have to watch them the whole time."
Even while speaking with The Daily Advertiser, Miss Sadler has one hand stopping a toddler from eating paint, and the other catching errant puzzle pieces as they frizbee across the room.
"You never know what they're going to do. We set up these [puzzle piece] letters because we thought they might like to point out some letters," she said.
"It didn't work. As soon as they got in, they did this," she said, gesturing to the strewn colours across the floor.
But the experience has done little to diminish the 14-year-old's ambitions.
"They are very fun, and a lot more intelligent than I think we make them out to be," she said.
"They know what they want, they know what they're doing, and I think they can tell your emotions too."
Each August and September, to coincide with the practical component of their studies, the high schoolers have set up the playgroup.
Lasting for six weeks, the playgroup has now been running consecutively since 2004.
PDHPE teacher Paula Shumack said in that time the experience has proven invaluable to the high school, and enriching to the children, who come from a wide variety of backgrounds.
"It's something they might not have the opportunity to do anywhere else," said Ms Shumack.
"The parents keep bringing their kids here because it's an opportunity to be messy and mix with others.
"For the year 9s, they learn the reality of children. They often start an activity thinking it will go one way, and then find that the kids play with it in a matter they were not expecting.
"The reality of children you can't learn without children, it's not just set up and go."