Storyteller Korney Chukovsky and 7 solid theses in raising children

2024 Author: Seth Attwood | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-16 15:55

The author of "Moidodyr", "Aibolit", "Mukhi-Tsokotuhi" and more than a dozen children's fairy tales was very modest, did not consider himself an overly talented writer. He simply wrote fabulous stories for his children (whom he was actively involved in raising), for the neighbors' children and for all the kids he met in life. Perhaps, the main talent of Chukovsky himself was fatherhood: his lessons can serve as an example for many generations of parents who want to develop giftedness and craving for art in a child.

Most often, Korney Ivanovich was upset by what was happening with contemporary children's literature. He attacked writers with irreconcilable criticism. Once he was even asked: "But if all the bad storytellers disappeared immediately, what can you offer in return?" And he took it and offered it. He offered not only in literature, but also in the upbringing of children. The diaries and memoirs of the Chukovskys family still serve as an excellent guideline for parents, help them understand children, reveal their talent and make them truly happy.

So, 7 main theses of Chukovsky's pedagogy:

Not a minute without work

Perhaps, for the children of Korney Chukovsky, there was no misconduct more terrible than messing around, playing cards or wasting time in some other way - this aroused contempt and anger in Chukovsky. Lydia Korneevna in her book "Memory of the Childhood" writes: "When he saw that we were wandering around to no avail, he instantly found something for us to do: wrap textbooks with colored paper, put books on the shelves in his office according to their height, weed flower beds or, opening a window, exhaust dust from heavy volumes. So that they do not get bogged down, do not loaf "! However, the rule of idle pastime did not apply to the game. Korney Chukovsky encouraged any activities that developed imagination, team spirit, made kids think, reason and create.

Our whole life is a game

Playing with children in his own games, Korney Chukovsky was not afraid to be ridiculous and funny, did not try to seem grown-up and speak down. At these moments, he became the same child, together with the children he sat right on the dusty road after the prearranged signal “blams!”. The writer loved to compose riddles for kids, and taught them to come up with poetic puzzles for the youngest - Boba. Despite his age, he participated in all the fun, and even carried stones to the shore along with everyone.

In her book of childhood memories, Chukovsky's daughter Lydia tells how, as children, she and her father fortified the coast of the Gulf of Finland, on which their summer cottage stood in the village of Kuokkale. It was necessary to fill the huge baskets with stones, which Kornei Ivanovich had installed on the shore. He himself took larger stones, the kids - smaller. “He will stop near the basket, wait for us - stones over his head - we will become a circle. "Throw it!" - he will command, and with what a merry roar the stones will burst into the basket! For the sake of this roar, we worked - carried it … Was it a game or work?"

English exam

For Chukovsky, English became a window to the world. According to the self-study guide found knows where, he, while still an Odessa boy, learned more and more new words every day. He knew that this baggage would one day allow him to read his favorite writers and poets in the original, and for the sake of this happiness of recognition he was ready to spend hours and days on new words. Every morning the children started with a little exam. It is necessary to answer to the father everything that was asked the day before, without hesitation and pause, and the English word was considered learned if the child could translate it in both directions, write, compose a sentence with him and recognize it in any text, in any context.

In a letter to his already adult seventeen-year-old son Nikolai Chukovsky writes:

Reading poetry

Every boat trip of the Chukovsky family was accompanied by the reading of poetry. Korney Ivanovich read a lot, by heart, and a wide variety of works, not at all for children. It also happened that many words in poetic works were unfamiliar and incomprehensible to the children, but despite this, they still understood what it was about, caught the general meaning thanks to the rhythm of the verse. Much later, Kornei Ivanovich wrote in the afterword to his book for adults about children "From two to five":

"An amazing children's ear for the musical sound of a verse, if only it is not ruined by meager adults, easily grasps all these variations of rhythms, which, I hope, greatly contribute to the development of poetry in children."

Culture and family values

Most of all, the writer was afraid of ignorance, he was afraid that his children would look like those illiterate ragamuffins whom he had seen enough of in his philistine Odessa childhood. He valued the status of an intellectual not at all out of vain considerations, he really felt sorry for mediocre people who did not know how and did not want to get acquainted with the huge, shining world culture. That is why he so implacably knocked laziness out of his own children, indifference to new knowledge, tried to reveal the talent of everyone, to infect everyone with a thirst for creativity, even if at first it had to be done by force.

Indifference to third-party assessments

For all his exactingness, Chukovsky was completely indifferent to the success of the children in the gymnasium. After the case when the director of the educational institution whipped the pupil, he completely transferred Kolya and Lida to home schooling, but until then the academic performance of the poet's son and daughter did not care. He did not believe that teachers could captivate children with their knowledge, and therefore did not demand results from them. But Korney Ivanovich encouraged any hobbies, for example, Kolya, who loved geography, brought atlases and maps from each trip.

It is surprising that he also treated unloved objects, helping children to get rid of their load: “I was sadly deprived of the slightest ability for arithmetic,” writes Lydia, “Having convinced that mathematical thinking is alien to me, that no matter how much I spend energy on problems and examples, the case ends in tears, not answers, he began to solve problems for me and shamelessly gave them to me to rewrite, to the great horror of our home teacher.

“KNOWS THE MULTIPLICATION TABLE, FOUR RULES - AND ENOUGH WITH IT! - HE SAID. - EIGHT YEARS HAPPEN ONCE IN A LIFE. THERE IS NOTHING TO LOAD THE HEAD TO WHAT THE HEAD IS RESISTING TO. AND SUCH FRESH PERCEPTION, SUCH MEMORY WILL NOT BE REPEATED ANYWHERE."

Race with fear

Courage is by no means an innate trait. Korney Chukovsky raised her in his children, proving by his own example that fear cannot overcome a person. He swam tirelessly, dived, went skiing. Even snowsurfing, considered a modern invention, the children's poet mastered at the beginning of the last century, rolling on the frozen Gulf of Finland, which surprised the surrounding residents a lot. “He teaches us not to be afraid, of me and Kolya. Orders to climb the spreading pines. Above. More. Higher! But then he himself stands under the pine tree and commands, and you can hold on to his voice,”recalls the storyteller's daughter.

But there was a real danger with the kids, not invented and not directed by the father. Once, while walking, they were attacked by a huge neighbor's dog, who dug a hole under the fence. Korney Chukovsky forbade the children to run away, took their hands and ordered them to repeat after him, no matter what happened: “One, two, three! Do what I do!"

“… He pushes our hands away and sinks to all fours in the dust. And we are next to him. All seven on all fours: he, yes Boba, yes Kolya, yes I, Matti, Ida, Pavka. "Woof woof woof!" he barks. We are not surprised. The dog is surprised to death. "Woof, woof, woof," we pick up. The dog, as if a stone had been thrown at it, with its tail between its legs, runs away. Probably for the first time in her dog's life she saw four-legged people. We continue to bark for a long time - long after he got up, brushing off his pants with his palms, and the dog on his belly crawled into the garden and huddled under the green porch. He does not immediately manage to calm us down.

IT TURNS OUT THIS IS SUCH PLEASURE - BARKING AT DOGS!"