Never mind, dear Jenny. China is definitely one of the great countries of thefuture. That is what our great sage, 'Abdu'l-Baha told us and that was back in
1912 before any sign of her present rise was visible. I hope China will manage
to stay far away from any wars because they are so terrible and drain a country.
Your fellow citizens will learn not to do the many things that distress you as they get their chances to bloom again. -- And they will. From the attitudes I see here on the forum the greatness is still there.
It is being discovered here that children need their time to play using theirown creativity. Often the best toys for children are a few big cardboard boxes.
This kind of toy can become many things, while what is bought in a store usually only remains what it was designed to be.
It is also being discovered here that in the past decade or so, and until now,
children are suffering from being schooled in too many lessons. More importantis time to play and do what children do so that they remain the creative beings
they were set up to be at birth.
A long time ago now David and Charles, I think that's who was at the other end of that conversation, had a continuing discussion here about developing creativity in students. Charles, a Chinese educator, was concerned about Westerners having more creativity. (I don't know if that's true or not.) David said he had observed that students in school were over-regimented and the otherperson agreed. They both thought that was cancelling the spontaneous growth of
creativity. They felt once that happened it wasn't easy to get it back again.
From recent research here it appears that beginning too early to expose a child
to formalized training is not good. I personally believe that free play is best
. Our four children are each very creative in their own way. None of it came from lessons. All of it was self-developed and is still unfolding in midadulthood.
Middle children here are often said to be the more creative and independent ones
. It is believed that this is because they are less directed. They have more freedom to develop themselves, even while they often feel that they were neglected somewhat by their parents in favour of the eldest or youngest. Youcan check this out in "birth order" attributes if you want.
I hope this give some parents here information to chew on. You can probably check it out through Google.
Friendly good wishes, Mary
