The Importance of Being Little: What Young Children Really Need from Grownups

As a parent and teacher, I highly recommend this book. I got this originally for insight on raising my kid and creating an environment that supports learning (human connection and play are more important than test prep and work sheets, unsurprisingly), but it also had an impact on me as a teacher. Though I teach high school, it's inspired me to try out some things in the classroom that might help ignite students' interest in actually learning vs. getting good grades. This book is pretty common sense, but still worth the read. The author is pretty realistic, and aside from the fact that after turning an outdoor frog (or was it a toad?) into a pet for a while, she released it back into the wild, she has some good ideas and advice.

After working in the field of Occupational Therapy for forty years, the last twenty involving from - "being very little" persons, to - "being very big little" persons. My love and interest is in the processes observable in the field of “developmental delay”. Captured in this label or scope, are areas of sensory, motor, perpetual, auditory-language and emotional processing, with differences of various extremes. The common denominator appeared to be that these people are extremely intelligent, intuitive, motivated, cooperative and with unusual initiatives. The common interruption and violation……… the education systems, the educationists, the politics and stupidity of people who don’t understand children and their development until death. In her, book , Erika Christakis has presented her experiences, insights and tremendous knowledge and understanding, as well as the simple solutions possible to help little people grow to be fulfilled,self-fufilling and contributing adults. Jennifer Lewkowski Occupational Therapist - ResultsOT Dip.OT : Jerusalem. Advanced Dip.OT: Neurosciences :Johannesburg. South Africa. Tel: +27 11 887 5945 Email:jenneot@gmail.com

This is a great book for parents wondering how to choose a preschool program that will encourage their children to play and think. It's thought-provoking material even if you don't agree with all of it. The one thing I disagreed with is the casual distrust and dislike of technology that appears throughout the book. The author stops short of claiming that technology is harmful, but mostly seems to think that it's sad compared to how she thinks a real childhood should look. There's a confusing passage on how letting your kids play videogames at night will make their childhood inauthentic, whatever that means. Another part talks about how ingenious it was for kids to throw water balloons spiked with urine at others, and on the next page we're told how far the American childhood has declined now that kids are playing with iPad apps. (One wonders if the quiet child who just wanted to be left alone rather than be hit with a water balloon would also feel nostalgic about that part of a traditional childhood.) As someone who hated even being hit with snowballs, but LOVED technology for as long as I can remember, I found the author's attitude to show a lack of understanding for children whose ideal childhood differs from her own. There's a lot of advice throughout about listening to what children want because they know best, but apparently that advice doesn't extend to trusting that children are interested in technology for a reason. Parents should let their kids take more risks outdoors, because bone fractures are not such a big deal - but with technology we should hold back because we haven't studied it enough yet. For those of us who will always remember the magic of discovering and learning how to operate every single function of the first electronic alarm clock, remote, or handheld game we got our hands on as kids, it's disheartening to listen to someone who doesn't understand that some kids find technology not just useful but also inspiring.

Erika Christakis writes with passion, scholarship, heart and humor. The Importance of Being Little offers insights about how young kids think and learn and offers ideas on how we can vastly improve pre-school. Christakis is a fierce advocate for PLAY and through the research she sites, shows how young kids think and learn. Her writing style is completely appealing, full of stories that hold our interest. This book is a great read for early childhood educators ( bless their souls! ), young parents and grandparents and all who care about the next generation. I hope The Importance of Being Little is the first of many from an original and well informed thinker. I look forward to the next scholarly book, or even a novel, by this author...she is that good!

As an early childhood educator, I found Christakis’ insights to be invaluable. Her research is solid and vast.

Great book. Fast delivery

As the author of a parenting book that takes the same approach toward preschoolers (Smart Love: The Comprehensive Guide to Understanding, Regulating, and Enjoying Your Child) I was thrilled with this book. The book presents a point of view that we desperately need to hear more of, namely letting children be children and giving them all of childhood to grow up in. Preschool should be about igniting children's curiosity and love of learning and school and not about pressuring them and making them resistant and dull. Christakis offers both practical and theoretical support for this position. A must read! Smart Love: The Comprehensive Guide to Understanding, Regulating and Enjoying Your Child

Great concept and important message- but kind of hard to read and stick with it.