The Importance of Being Little

“Christakis . . . expertly weaves academic research, personal experience and anecdotal evidence into her book . . . a bracing and convincing case that early education has reached a point of crisis . . . her book is a rare thing: a serious work of research that also happens to be well-written and personal . . . engaging and important.”
 –Washington Post
“What kids need from grown-ups (but aren’t getting)…an impassioned plea for educators and parents to put down the worksheets and flash cards, ditch the tired craft projects (yes, you, Thanksgiving Handprint Turkey) and exotic vocabulary lessons, and double-down on one, simple word: play.”
–NPR
The New York Times bestseller that gives a  daring problem to the standard knowledge about early childhood, with a practical program to encourage mother and father and academics to rethink how and the place younger youngsters be taught finest by taking the kid’s eye view of the educational atmosphere
 
To a four-year-old watching bulldozers at a development web site or chasing butterflies in flight, the world is awash with promise. Little youngsters come into the world hardwired to be taught in just about any setting and about any matter. Yet in right this moment’s preschool and kindergarten lecture rooms, studying has been diminished to scripted classes and suspect metrics that too usually undervalue a toddler’s intelligence whereas overtaxing the kid’s rising mind. These mismatched expectations wreak havoc on the household: mother and father concern that in the event that they select the “wrong” program, their youngster gained’t get into the “right” school. But Yale early childhood professional Erika Christakis says our fears are wildly misplaced. Our anxiousness about getting ready and safeguarding our youngsters’s future appears to have reached a fever pitch at a time when, sarcastically, science offers us extra certainty than ever earlier than that younger youngsters are exceptionally robust thinkers.
            In her pathbreaking e-book, Christakis explains what it’s prefer to be a younger youngster in America right this moment, in a world designed by and for adults, the place we’ve confused education with studying. She affords real-life options to real-life points, with nuance and course that takes us far past the standard prescriptions for fewer exams, extra play. She appears at youngsters’s use of language, their inventive expressions, the way in which their imaginations develop, and the way they construct deep emotional bonds to stretch the boundaries of their small worlds. Rather than litter their worlds with an increasing number of stuff, typically the wisest course for us is to learn to get out of their manner.
            Christakis’s message is energizing and reassuring: younger youngsters are inherently highly effective, and so they (and their mother and father) will flourish once we be taught new methods of restoring the important early studying atmosphere to at least one that’s finest suited to the littlest learners. This daring and pragmatic problem to the standard knowledge peels again the thriller of childhood, revealing a spot that’s wealthy with chance.