We live in an age where there are videos of everything. However, I have discovered that when it comes to stories and imagination TV, movies, and videos can be limiting. For this reason, a child who is brought up watching videos, TV, and movies alone, will have less imagination than one who reads a book… even a book with a few pictures. When you read a book, your mind fills in the details. We are visual creatures. We desire to see what it is happening, and therefore our imagination will create our own “movie,” in our mind, of how the words on a page might come to life.
This is in no way a rant on movies, because I am a big, big fan. But think about this reality:
BOOKS INSPIRE IMAGINATION…
MOVIES RELY ON SOMEONE ELSE’S IMAGINATION.
This can be good and bad for a young child. The reason many films, or television shows, have a rating on them is because they are stimulating something that, visually, may be out of bounds for a child. The Lord of the Rings Trilogy, by Peter Jackson, for example is PG-13 because of “scary images.” I know many who read this book series long before the age of 13, and yet had no problem with “scary images” because our minds only know what they know.
As much as your imagination can see beyond the scope of current reality, for the most part – especially in young children – it doesn’t conjure up evil images that it knows nothing about.
J.R.R. Tolkien did not describe the goblins, orcs, and trolls in the intricate detail that Peter Jackson showed them. I personally was surprised at how gross the orc coming out of the ground looked when I saw Peter Jackson’s imagination of it. It was different than the way I saw it in my mind when I read it in the book.
In the same way, there is a scene in “The Voyage of the Dawn Treader” by C.S. Lewis where Aslan removes a curse upon a young boy who has turned into a dragon. I described this scene to a group of kids in Sunday School once, and was approached by one of the volunteer’s afterword about the vivid content of what I spoke on. I explained to him this very concept, which opened his mind to the concept and satisfied his objection.
Your imagination creates vivid images within the channels of what you already know. If you’ve never seen, first hand, a person whose skin is being ripped off, your mind simply conjures up a version of what you think that looks like and often your brain buffers away the harsh “scaring” realities of the concept, when you don’t see it before your eyes.
Young kids who read, thrive, both in their innocence and in their imagination. Imagination, by and large, is a missing piece of society these days. Even many movies are simply old stories being remade, rather than new imaginative stories that are brought about by imaginative minds.
“WE ARE MEN OF ACTION…”
So, Dad… I challenge you to limit the intake of someone else’s visual imagination upon your child(ren) today. Go to the library, or bookstore and find a book for them to read. Or better yet find a book to read together (particularly if they are small) this will begin to instill a love for reading, and boost their imagination for years to come. Here is a perfect one for you to read to your daughter… it just came out!
You can do it! Find a book appropriate for your kid(s) today!