Latest / Homeschool Insights - Biblical Home Education Inspiration in Under 10 Minutes! / Why Agenda-Driven Kids’ Books Feel Fake - S.D. Smith
Transcript
- speaker-0: I did want to just tell a good story. And what hap has happened from that is an unbelievable amount of application for conversations about reality and and and goodness, truth, beauty, the Bible, the kingdom, the all these kinds of things. There's applicability, but it's not allegory. It's not me sort of heavy-handedly trying to dominate that. speaker-1: Most people know that I am a Charlotte Mason inspired homeschooler. ⁓ meaning that living literature, with I use the word living because books, books that are really, really good books, you said this, they place you in a setting or an era or a situation with the characters. You feel like you become part of it. And so when we're thinking about how books ultimately Often good books have some kind of good versus evil fight. And we're reading a really good book, and we're on the team that might be going through hard things, but they are ultimately fighting for good. That is definitely one way that our kids can be equipped, just experiencing the story with those characters. When you set out to write the Green Ember series, were you specifically thinking, the kids that read these books, I want them to understand good versus evil. I want them to be equipped. What was in your mind as you were writing these for families? speaker-0: So it was much simpler than that for me. I I didn't have any of that in mind, honestly. I I had a really ⁓ I had a it was it was very clear, very sincere, very organic, and that was tell my kids a wonderful story, ⁓ an exciting story, an adventurous story, something that they would love. And I think when you do that ⁓ and your own heart, your own roots are in sort of this ⁓ I hope like harmony with reality and I hope rooted in like the Bible and the truth of of of how God made the world. I think that that inevitably like comes in. So I think I I wasn't trying to say that let's teach kids how to be brave. And I think when we do that, we end up there is a there is a I would say a high likelihood of reducing the story to just a vehicle to convey a truth. And I think like conveying truth is really important. But I don't know that, you know, I think like if you if you're going out to lunch with a friend, you know, friend from high school or something call calls you up and says, Hey, can we have lunch? ⁓ that's great. And you start to talk and everything's going really well and you're telling about your kids and and lose your job and all these things. And and then they sort of say, Well, it's ⁓ yeah, I'd I would really like to tell you about this, this ⁓ product that I have. And and you kind of and you start to realize, ⁓ this isn't about friendship. This isn't about a gift. This isn't about us standing together. I'm like a contact and I'm being sold to. And that's I mean, it's not that's not the worst thing in the world that can happen, but you just we feel the phoniness of that in different even in ministry when people are are reduced to just sort of like I'm making contacts or something, I'm not talking to human beings. And I I just think there's a There's a dehumanizing thing with that in relationships. And I think that there is a a loss of enchantment when we when that's the approach in storytelling. So and there's a long conversation about that. And there's this good, there's the best ways to do it and there's the worst ways to do it. And so there's a lot of ⁓ nuance, I would say, in that conversation. But for me, I was had a real clarity for myself about I'm just going to tell stories and and I'm going to give it to God. And I wanna be faithful. I don't want to tell any lies. That was really important. I would wanna like I I don't think it's cute to like make something up that would be sort of counter to this sort of fundamental reality. I don't want to do anything like that, I don't wanna confuse kids in any way, but I I did want to just tell a good story. And I think the and I'm gonna give that to God and give my kids to God. And and what hap has happened from that is an unbelievable amount of application, like like Tolkien talked about this sort of Like how people have taken taken this and it's been useful for them or good for them for conversations about reality and and and goodness, truth, beauty, the Bible, the kingdom, the all these kinds of things. There's applicability, but it's not allegory. It's not me sort of heavy-handedly trying to ⁓ dominate them. This is what you need. I think when we when we have that, I think either left or right or wherever. Politically, I think we we get a sense of that and we feel like, ⁓ this is propaganda. I I understand, I know what propaganda is. And and when we get old enough to sort of sniff it out, we we get kind of resentful and ⁓ of it and and and w you know, I you see that in a Hollywood movie where you that's maybe like a a a a position that you don't agree with and you're like, ⁓ that's kind of feels gross where there's they're trying to just sort of do this. So I think it's kind of gross often when we do it too. I mean Maybe we have good motivations, but I don't know that it's I don't know, the gross is the right word, but sometimes it reduces it to some pretty crummy storytelling. And I don't wanna I didn't want to do that. So I want to just be faithful and be a good storyteller. Like do a good job at that. That was job one. And I'm amazed what God has done out of that sort of like very simple proposition. speaker-2: This episode of Homeschool Insights is brought to you by BJU Press Homeschool, CTC Math, and the Explorer Bible for Kids. Visit the show notes to learn more about these excellent resources. And for more encouragement, listen to the Schoolhouse Rocked Podcast at Schoolhouse Rocked.com.