The neighbor kid you taught to ride a bike will remember you longer than you’ll remember them.

Attention from an older kid lands enormously on a younger one. When you are eight, somebody four years ahead who spends an afternoon on you is the most important person in the street, and that afternoon gets stored permanently. From your side it was a Saturday you barely recall. The asymmetry is how memory and status work at that age, and it means you have more influence than you feel.

Assume somebody younger is watching and be a bit better than you have to be. Learn the little kid next door’s name. Teach them one thing properly, with patience, and let them be bad at it for a while.