Polymorphism in object-oriented programming

Polymorphism is a big word that means something pretty simple. It is when you have one thing that can be different things at the same time. Think about a toy that can be played with as a car or a robot. It can be different things, but it is still the same toy.

In programming, polymorphism means that one object can take on many different forms. For example, a parent object can have many different child objects that inherit their behavior from the parent. These child objects can behave differently from each other, but they still share the same features as the parent.

For instance, imagine you have a bunch of animals like dogs, cats, and birds. They all share some common traits such as they can move, eat, and sleep. However, each type of animal will have its behavior for these actions. Dogs will bark, cats will meow, and birds will chirp. Despite the differences in their behavior, they are all animals.

So, polymorphism allows you to write code that can handle different objects in the same way. In other words, you can write a program to interact with pets in general, without worrying about whether the pet is a dog, cat, or bird. You just need to make sure that each type of animal has its own behavior for moving, eating, and sleeping.

Therefore, polymorphism makes programming simpler and more efficient because you can write code that works for many objects instead of writing code for each object separately.