Sky: 11 and 9

I'm going to assume you mean some Skyloft here. Which, understandable, I stare at that place and go 'no seriously how does this function'. Also thank you very much for entertaining me please come again anytime!

The most obvious answer is that Skyloft is just part of a much great network of islands we don't get to visit in game, in which education of people's kids is exchanged for money and resources, and also it grows a couple of basic staples - namely pumpkins - nearby.

But that's also kinda boring.

So, given how simple the duties of a Skyloftian Knight are, they also double up as farmers - one of their duties (other than rescuing people) is to fly out to the outmost islands and tend the farms there. There's a few dedicated farmers who might live out there, and its very basic crops - potion supplies, wheat, pumpkins - but its just about enough. When combined with the fish from the waterfall pond, which is carefully managed to ensure the population remains steady despite being the primary food source of the island.

Post land-settlement, things obviously change. A whole lot more land and variety become available to the Hylians, though they are still short on hands. For a while they are not so focused on agriculture, rather lending other expertise - namely building, repairs, and using their loftwings to transport goods much more safely and quickly - for the races already inhabiting the surface. Again, they still grow the basics - and share with the people remaining in Skyloft, expanding everyone's diets - but fancier things come from this trade.

It will take a few generations for them to be more than a small village in population size. By then they'll have more crafts to contribute, and have also worked out to farm under the constraints of these pesky things called 'seasons'. But that's for a time when Link is gone, so we'll leave it there for now.

Wait. You said 9 and 11, not 11 and 13. Well now for 9!

Being an island based around a school, education rates are pretty high. Everyone on Skyloft knows at least basic reading, writing, and maths, though not on the outlying islands.

I tend to think that early education happens mostly at home, either taught by the child's parents, those responsible for the child, or if there's a few kids of similar age maybe sharing responsibility. I like to think that until whatever happened to them happened, Link's parents also taught Zelda, her mother having been dead a while and her father being much more busy running the school than the average adult. If there were kids on Skyloft of an appropriate age, I kinda imagine Peatrice ending up teaching them? She seems very bored and her business only doing so much, so overseeing their reading lessons whilst also manning her stall.

In this way kids would learn their letters and numbers, but also the basics of their parent's professions. Most children stay in the family business, it being easiest to teach this way, with the exception of those who go on to be knights - or who are the children of knights, where the child is unsuited to the formal education.

The knight's academy is the one obvious education institute. I think of it generally as taking on people in their later teens - specifically you must be fully bonded to an adult loftwing and can demonstrate more than basic competence in flying them - more like a university than a school, and being the only place of formal and further education in Skyloft. Here people do learn combat and advanced flying and similar, but also other bits; not everyone who graduates it goes on to be a knight - its also the primary place to learn botany and history and mythology and medicine, simply because it homes both the library and the handful of academics - but it is what it is best known for. Rescuing drunks and children wandering off the island is important business, but so is patching them up after, improving agricultural efficiency when space is so limited, and preserving the lore and traditions of Skyloft.

(Note: going with Skyloft is just a uni town in a much wider community would result in the residents of Skyloft proper being a minority, with farmers and others living in the more normal areas being less well educated - not living and breathing a school. It does allow for more organised childhood education, and probably necessitates entrance exams for the knight's academy, though I imagine the population is still small - there's no evidence of a government structure in SkSw - enough that its still small groups of children and one or two designated teachers sort of deal, rather than the formal schooling of modern irl stuff.)

Here they are! They're the bashful red panda and bashful penguin. My datemate and I just bought them for one another (you can see him a little in the bg lol). The penguin is his and red panda is mine. They're dating! Although they don't have names quite yet.

The shop we got them from also had a medium toffee puppy and I really really wanted him, to the point where I almost asked for him instead of the plush I got. But we each only had enough for one jellycat today and I've wanted the red panda for a while now. I'm hoping to go back when I get paid to get the puppy but if not I'll just order him off the website. Either way I'm happy with my new baby and my love is infatuated with his penguin.