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Rating: 
Summary: Everyday Genius
Review: As a student, I was assigned this reading. I found the latter half of the book to be the most useful. However, I thought that the first eleven chapters could have been revised to approximately three chapters. The most impressive part of this book is Kline's examples of his learning philosophies. These examples include games, activities, and exercises that are applicable in the home and classroom. Overall this read was intelligent and insightful. Kline has some truly amazing ideas.
Rating: 
Summary: Great for Adults!
Review: I sometimes forget to slow my life down enough to pay attention to the lessons that children can teach me about how to live my life. Every child that is born into this world is a laughing, singing, creative and powerful individual. Often it seems that by the time we reach adulthood we have lost the ability to laugh and sing. Peter Kline seriously addresses the process of learning from all angles. Extremely instructive to adults!!!Some favorite passages: "Creativity is a function of our whole personality and its interaction with the world, not something we turn on or off. The more we see ourselves as innovative and original thinkers, the more creative we tend to be"..."So whatever else we may say about creativity, these three things are essential to it: we must value our uniqueness, we must trust the worth of our experience, and we must be able to draw freely and widely on the full range of that experience, which is the content of our memory." P 190 "Experiencing disharmony between what we say and what we feel leads to a vague sense of anxiety and not being at home in the world - a sense that some philosophers assume is an inescapable part of the human condition. However, the origin of this anxiety is not human nature, it is in our withholding or even becoming unaware of what we really feel - in failing to live our lives fully. Accepting emotions helps us get beneath the surface in order to discover the rich and wonderful process of being." P 219 "Whenever you feel you are learning nothing from the person you are with, or the situation you are in, it is time to return again to whatever springs inspire in you the development of new learning skills, and drink as deeply as you can. Then you will be better able to discover that each person you meet has a fund of experinece so rich that no matter what thier differences in worldly accomplishments may be from yours, you can learn from them and they from you. Some of my own finest learning experiences have come from those who had lived long lives without the advantage of education or even literacy. Experience of any kind is always richly and uniquely instructive." P 252
Rating: 
Summary: Huge waste of time
Review: What an absolutely dreadful, boring, useless book. I bought it based on the reviews above, and boy am I mad that I did. As a teacher, I thought I would take away something, anything, from this book. Instead, my mind is slightly more numb because of it. This author says the same thing 800 different times in only slightly different ways. He could have pared the whole thing down to one inspiring quote. Instead, his repetitive rambling takes all inspiration out of his words. Truly, I love any book that inspires me or gives me ideas for working with children, but this book was AWFUL. The author also spends a lot of time tooting his own horn. I tend to roll my eyes when he does, because he makes ridiculous claims like, "I spoke with this child for ten minutes and he went from a high-school dropout to a brilliant doctor." I made that up, but that's the gist. He's full of it. Save yourself time & money and leave this book alone.
Rating:
Summary: Huge waste of time
Review: What an absolutely dreadful, boring, useless book. I bought it based on the reviews above, and boy am I mad that I did. As a teacher, I thought I would take away something, anything, from this book. Instead, my mind is slightly more numb because of it. This author says the same thing 800 different times in only slightly different ways. He could have pared the whole thing down to one inspiring quote. Instead, his repetitive rambling takes all inspiration out of his words. Truly, I love any book that inspires me or gives me ideas for working with children, but this book was AWFUL. The author also spends a lot of time tooting his own horn. I tend to roll my eyes when he does, because he makes ridiculous claims like, "I spoke with this child for ten minutes and he went from a high-school dropout to a brilliant doctor." I made that up, but that's the gist. He's full of it. Save yourself time & money and leave this book alone.
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