Smart and Capable
Supporting Children's Agency in a Complex World
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Smart and Capable
Narrated by:
Kristen Kallen-Keck
Pre-order Now for €15.99
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Narrated by:
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Kristen Kallen-Keck
Summary
Young children are smart and capable. They already have most of what they need to learn and grow. Author Dr. Jennifer Keys Adair, a Professor of Early Childhood Education and a preschool teacher-turned-cultural anthropologist draws upon 20 years of stories and scientific evidence to show why agency is so important for children’s learning, even in a society that can be dangerous and complicated.
Using examples from many different countries and communities around the world – from Austin, Texas to Bangalaru, Karnataka - this book offers nine core experiences that honor and support young children’s agency: Exploration, Participation, Caring for the Natural World, Conflict, Difficult Discussions, Caring for People, Multilingualism, Multiplicity, and Protection.
Adair emphasizes that the nine experiences have endless variation and will look different depending on where you live, what you have access to, and the types of realities you face. This book is not a manual or a "how to” for teachers and parents, because there is no one best way to support children’s agency. To make this case, Adair includes stories of infants, toddlers, and young children in parks, homes, childcare programs, preschools, elementary classrooms and community centers using their agency in a variety of circumstances.
The heart of the book is a hope that adults will find their own ways to create environments in which children can enact their agency early and safely, so children can shift the world they are inheriting to the world they want.
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Reviews
“Both a celebration of young children’s agency and a challenge to adults to support it fully.”
—Booklist
“Smart and Capable is a powerful, rigorously researched invitation to recognize children—especially those too often controlled or pathologized—as imaginative, agentic human beings who deserve safety, complexity, and freedom. I highly recommend this book for anyone committed to creating the conditions for young people to thrive.”
—Dr. Dena Simmons, author, scholar, and founder of LiberatED
“Smart and Capable is not just a book about young children. Careful, respectful observation has yielded a profound and humane work about building a better society.”
—Anya Kamenetz, author of The Stolen Year: How COVID Changed Children’s Lives, and Where We Go Now
“This striking book demonstrates how children are compassionate and capable when adults support their agency. Even for children in unsupportive settings, Adair offers examples of how they find ways to be surreptitiously helpful to classmates and sneakily creative in their play.”
—Joseph Tobin, coauthor of Preschool in Three Cultures: Japan, China, and the United States
“In this rich account of her observations of young children and their interactions with adults in the US and abroad, Adair skillfully describes how children engage in and make sense of the world. The book’s core theme of agency comes to life in a series of compelling and well-curated examples of children participating in different activities, settings, and contexts that demonstrate the ways they expand their capabilities and understand and respond to life experiences, possibilities, and challenges. This personal and scholarly text is both a source of powerful images of children being ‘smart and capable’ and a call for adults—educators, parents, and others—to build upon children’s knowledge and elevate their strengths.”
—Vivian L. Gadsden, William T. Carter Emerita Professor of Child Development and Professor of Education, University of Pennsylvania
—Booklist
“Smart and Capable is a powerful, rigorously researched invitation to recognize children—especially those too often controlled or pathologized—as imaginative, agentic human beings who deserve safety, complexity, and freedom. I highly recommend this book for anyone committed to creating the conditions for young people to thrive.”
—Dr. Dena Simmons, author, scholar, and founder of LiberatED
“Smart and Capable is not just a book about young children. Careful, respectful observation has yielded a profound and humane work about building a better society.”
—Anya Kamenetz, author of The Stolen Year: How COVID Changed Children’s Lives, and Where We Go Now
“This striking book demonstrates how children are compassionate and capable when adults support their agency. Even for children in unsupportive settings, Adair offers examples of how they find ways to be surreptitiously helpful to classmates and sneakily creative in their play.”
—Joseph Tobin, coauthor of Preschool in Three Cultures: Japan, China, and the United States
“In this rich account of her observations of young children and their interactions with adults in the US and abroad, Adair skillfully describes how children engage in and make sense of the world. The book’s core theme of agency comes to life in a series of compelling and well-curated examples of children participating in different activities, settings, and contexts that demonstrate the ways they expand their capabilities and understand and respond to life experiences, possibilities, and challenges. This personal and scholarly text is both a source of powerful images of children being ‘smart and capable’ and a call for adults—educators, parents, and others—to build upon children’s knowledge and elevate their strengths.”
—Vivian L. Gadsden, William T. Carter Emerita Professor of Child Development and Professor of Education, University of Pennsylvania
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