February 1, 2011

• Every Child Should Have a Chance

  Last week I made a list of my favorite parenting books, only to find myself wanting to add another:  my current bookclub selection, Ten Ways to Destroy Your Child’s Imagination by Anthony Esolen, PhD.

  Now it is displaced by one I had overlooked: Leila Denmark’s
  Every Child Should Have a Chance, written in 1971 and reprinted many times. 

  Today, February 1st, is Dr. Denmark’s birthday.  Here’s a link to the newspaper’s tribute (AJC link).

  While she marks her 113th, I commend to you her parenting advice which is timeless.

  This book is not your run-of-the-mill manual full of methodologies. 

  Therefore, reading it should take a place of priority.

  It doesnt matter if you dont have any babies right now.

  My copy is a Second Edition Hardback given to me by my mother, when our first child was born in 1984.

  I’d like to list the Table of Contents in order to pique your interest; and copy a selection from the chapter about careers in order to encourage us as we guide our charges into their lives of service.

  In other words, I believe the information in this volume is relevant to everyone whether you have children or not.  In addition, the storytelling style of Denmark’s writing plus the personal vignettes tie into my bookclub’s discussion of sparking the imaginations of our children.

  Table of Contents

  1)   First Visit to a Newborn Baby
  2)   The Stages in the Life of a Child
  3)   Feeding Children
  4)   Thumb Sucking
  5)   Clothes
  6)   Nursery School and Kindergarten
  7)   Looking for the Obvious
  8)   Grandparents
  9)   Teaching a Child Manners, Decorum, and Customs
  10) Natural Laws, The Laws of the Creator
  11) Selecting a Way of Life, Career
  12) Dissipation

  Now for the vignette describing Denmark’s determination in following her dreams.

  I finished college and tried teaching for two years, but that was not my field.  I sent my application in to medical college, but it was not acknowledged.  The day for medical school to open I was there and asked to be admitted but was refused on the grounds that the school had fifty-two students already and there was room for only thirty-six so it would be out of the question for me to get a place.  I asked them to just fix me a place in any corner and take me on a trial basis for a few days.  So the officials of the school got together that night and decided to let me stay.  They had one married man, one Yankee boy nobody wanted to work with so they put us three outcasts together.  (This was a Southern college.)  A married man in school at that time was not at all popular and a Yankee less so, and even less than that, a female student.

  Amazing, right?

  Failure is not a word in my vocabulary and I’m glad to learn from this story that it wasnt in Dr Denmark’s either.  She hurdled over setbacks and obstacles because she could see her vision.

  May Every Child Should Have a Chance help you help your child see his/hers.

   

   

  Bonus Link to my pastor’s wife’s tribute to Dr. Denmark in 2009.  Becky chronicles the pediatricians life in three parts, ending with a dear poem.

  • 7:51 am
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