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Design of Childhood: How the Material World Shapes Independent Kids

The Design of Childhood: How the Material World Shapes Independent Kids

By Alexandra Lange

From building blocks to city blocks, an eye-opening exploration of how children's playthings and physical surroundings affect their development.

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Book Information

Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing
Publish Date: 03/10/2020
Pages: 416
ISBN-13: 9781632866363
ISBN-10: 1632866366
Language: English

Full Description

Nothing short of spectacular . . . A secret guidebook to a landscape in which we all dwell, but so often fail to see. --Tom Vanderbilt, bestselling author of Traffic

From building blocks to city blocks, an eye-opening exploration of how children's playthings and physical surroundings affect their development.
Parents obsess over their children's playdates, kindergarten curriculum, and every bump and bruise, but the toys, classrooms, playgrounds, and neighborhoods little ones engage with are just as important. These objects and spaces encode decades, even centuries of changing ideas about what makes for good child-rearing--and what does not. Do you choose wooden toys, or plastic, or, increasingly, digital? What do youngsters lose when seesaws are deemed too dangerous and slides are designed primarily for safety? How can the built environment help children cultivate self-reliance? In these debates, parents, educators, and kids themselves are often caught in the middle. Now, prominent design critic Alexandra Lange reveals the surprising histories behind the human-made elements of our children's pint-size landscape. Her fascinating investigation shows how the seemingly innocuous universe of stuff affects kids' behavior, values, and health, often in subtle ways. And she reveals how years of decisions by toymakers, architects, and urban planners have helped-and hindered-American youngsters' journeys toward independence. Seen through Lange's eyes, everything from the sandbox to the street becomes vibrant with buried meaning. The Design of Childhood will change the way you view your children's world-and your own.

About the Author

Alexandra Lange's writing has appeared in New York, the New York Times, Curbed, Dwell, The New Yorker, and many other magazines and design journals. She has authored and coauthored several previous books, including Writing About Architecture.

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