Some Zelda appreciation: when they say the game is open world, they are not playing around. There is clearly an order in which the game designers are intending for you to do things, but you are totally free to ignore it.

So, for example, I accidentally stumbled on the realm of the fish people way earlier than I was supposed to, and got my ass kicked repeatedly by all the shock-arrow-wielding lizards and such. But the game didn't stop me.

There are a few specific sequences you have to follow, where doing this quest gets you that item and so on. But they are few. Mostly you really can just wander around and do what you want when you want.

It's also nice because if, say, you're feeling frustrated by the teleporting banana ninjas, you can just forget about them for a while and go do the whole giant robot bird quest instead.

You're welcome to just stroll on into the final dungeon whenever you feel like it (though you'll probably get instantly killed.) You can also skip big swaths of early stage grinding if you don't mind being underequipped for a while.

Like, I didn't happen to stumble on the fake Polynesian village until pretty deep in the game. And now am like, oh, this would have been useful to know about, there are so many useful plants and things growing all over the place. But that was on me for not exploring carefully.

Feel like there's some parallels in here for education? Or maybe there aren't? Quarantine brain prevents me from following this thread all the way.