Did you attend the Classical Conversations practicum with your child in a camp this year? If so, you received this month’s book club selection, ten ways to destroy the imagination of your child (I kept the title lowercase here, because that’s how it’s printed on the book cover! Which by the way, I like!). I have yet to crack the spine on this book, but I’m excited to get started.
Here’s the book description from Amazon —
“Play dates, soccer practice, day care, political correctness, drudgery without facts, television, video games, constant supervision, endless distractions: these and other insidious trends in child rearing and education are now the hallmarks of childhood. As author Anthony Esolen demonstrates in this elegantly written, often wickedly funny book, almost everything we are doing to children now constricts their imaginations, usually to serve the ulterior motives of the constrictors.
Ten Ways to Destroy the Imagination of Your Child takes square aim at these accelerating trends, in a bitingly witty style reminiscent of C. S. Lewis, while offering parents—and children—hopeful alternatives. Esolen shows how imagination is snuffed out at practically every turn: in the rearing of children almost exclusively indoors; in the flattening of love to sex education, and sex education to prurience and hygiene; in the loss of traditional childhood games; in the refusal to allow children to organize themselves into teams; in the effacing of the glorious differences between the sexes; in the dismissal of the power of memory, which creates the worst of all possible worlds in school—drudgery without even the merit of imparting facts; in the strict separation of the child’s world from the adult’s; and in the denial of the transcendent, which places a low ceiling on the child’s developing spirit and mind.
Ten Ways to Destroy the Imagination of Your Child confronts contemporary trends in parenting and schooling by reclaiming lost traditions. This practical, insightful book is essential reading for any parent who cares about the paltry thing that childhood has become, and who wants to give a child something beyond the dull drone of today’s culture.”
Peek your interest? It certainly has mine! Let’s check it out together & see what we think. I’ll post my thoughts here in about a month. I hope you’ll share yours too!
Can’t WAIT to read this- I’ve been holding on to it since practicum! :o)
Yes, me too! I’m glad you’ll be reading along : )
haha…just got it from the library…had to special order it. Looks like someone overheard my FB rantings and compiled a book and is going to make a jillion dollars. Ain’t that always the way?!! -Mo
HA!!!
This looks like a great book! Oooo I’ll have to see if it’s in my library too!