July 13, 2007 6:06 PM
Teaching compassion
In the Picture Says a Thousand Words department:
Pertaining to your recent post with the photos by Peter Menzel (What the World Eats) --I bought Hungry Planet and Material World last winter. Our library (we home school our three children) is somewhere between 2000 and 3000 books and I wanted to show my children how the rest of the world lives and eats even before they are old enough to go and see it in person.I really like these books!
The day they arrived, we were all combing through them, commenting, noticing some specifics, and my 10 yr. old son turned to the page with the family from Chad and asked, “Mamma, where is the rest of their food?” Now, my children know they are blessed with more than their needs, due in large part because my husband and I tell them almost daily, but seeing the faces of these people and the little food they had to eat for one week made it more real. In Hungry Planet, there are lists for each family with break downs on produce, fast food, etc., with the cost converted to US dollars. Material World is equally as good. Both of these books are well worth owning for a family who wants their children to become knowledgeable and well rounded as to specifics of the rest of the world. I’m glad you found the photos and included them on your site.
Again, thanks!
Blessings,
von
Our family owns Material World and it is a remarkable book.
I would add that these two volumes, while not aimed specifically at children, can be very effective in contrasting lives of families in different countries in a way children can understand, planting seeds of compassion and - hopefully - future generosity.
See also my Countering a Culture of Plenty.
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Comments
Thank you for those wonderful titles.
This is just where my family is right now - doing all we can to transform our thinking from Us to Them--globally as well as in our own back yard.
Posted by: Lisa | July 13, 2007 8:43 PM
Thankyou so much for the links. We always try to encourage our daughters to live compassionatley in awareness of world issues. These resources will be very helpful :)
Suzy
Posted by: Suzy Kopliku | July 16, 2007 2:53 PM
