Parents must begin to discover their children as individuals of developing tastes and views and so help them be, and see, themselves as thinking, feeling people. It is far too easy for a middle-years child to absorb an over-simplified picture of himself as a sloppy, unreliable, careless, irresponsible, lazy creature and not much more--an attitude toward himself he will carry far beyond these years.

Parents must begin to discover their children as individuals of developing tastes and views and so help them be, and see, themselves as thinking, feeling people. It is far too easy for a middle-years child to absorb an over-simplified picture of himself as a sloppy, unreliable, careless, irresponsible, lazy creature and not much more--an attitude toward himself he will carry far beyond these years.

No school can work well for children if parents and teachers do not act in partnership on behalf of the children's best interests

Children of eight and nine who love their mothers dearly will cross to the other side of the street when they see her coming, if they happen to be with friends, because to greet or be greeted by their mothers in the presence of peers is to acknowledge having been (and perhaps still being) a baby.

They [parents] can help the children work out schedules for homework, play, and television that minimize the conflicts involved inwhat to do first. They can offer moral support and encouragement to persist, to try again, to struggle for understanding and mastery. And they can share a child's pleasure in mastery and accomplishment. But they must not do the job for the children.

The frantic search of five-year-olds for friends can thus be seen to forecast the beginnings of a basic shift in the parent-childrelationship, a shift which will occur gradually over many long years, and in which a child needs not only the support of child allies engaged in the same struggle but also the understanding of his parents.

Helping children at a level of genuine intellectual inquiry takes imagination on the part of the adult. Even more, it takes the courage to become a resource in unfamiliar areas of knowledge and in ones for which one has no taste. But parents, no less than teachers, must respect a child's mind and not exploit it for their own vanity or ambition, or to soothe their own anxiety.