Roundtable Book Discussion

Under Pressure by Carl Honoré
Wednesday, April 14, 2010
7pm at The Soulard School

 
"(T)he pressure to give our children the best of everything and make them the best at everything is backfiring on kids, parents, and society as a whole. We feel we have to push, polish, and protect our offspring with superhuman zeal - or else we're somehow falling down on the job. I hope that readers will come to the end of the book and breathe a huge sigh of relief. Especially parents. I want to inspire readers to ease off and find the natural balance between doing too much and too little for children." - Carl Honoré

Don't forget to join us for our second roundtable book discussion. This month, we will be exploring Carl Honoré's book Under Pressure. Honoré is the bestselling author of In Praise of Slowness, which took a look at our high-speed lifestyles and the toll taken on us by such rush. Under Pressure, Honoré's second book, picks up this topic once again, this time focusing on a realm near and dear to us at The Soulard School - childhood. Looking across cultures and throughout history, he shows us how hyper-parenting  and "academic hothousing is subject to the law of diminishing returns." In an age of baby Mandarin classes, cell phones, dual-income households, cram schools, video surveillance, and violent-laden nightly news reports, it can be difficult to slow down, lighten up, and (in the words of the Reggio-minded folks) "do nothing without joy." But Honoré encourages us to do just that.