Srimad Bhagavatam- A Comprehensive Guide for Young Readers (Canto-4)

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After you have read and discussed the translations with your children, you can turn to this guide for a chapter summary, key themes, analogies, and higher-thinking questions. There are many fun and educational activities for each chapter, including creative writing exercises, art projects, and critical-thinking activities. The activities accommodate a range of different learning styles, with the aim of cultivating in our children a lifelong love for reading Srimad-Bhagavatam.

It was then that I started doing workshops, during which we would sit together with their children and I would demonstrate how to guide a discussion in a way that evoked the child's curiosity about the nature of the world, God, the self, and the purpose of life. Together, we would read the translations of a chapter of Srimad- Bhagavatam and discuss the stories, main themes, and great personalities. We would talk about the relevance of Srimad-Bhagavatam in our own lives - how it provides spiritual solutions to material problems. Both the children and parents were thoroughly enlivened and absorbed in the discussions.

When I explained at seminars how I taught my boys Srimad-Bhagavatam through interactive reading and discussion, hundreds of parents were inspired to follow. However, many parents who wanted to study the Bhagavatam with their children was uncertain about how to do it. They needed a formal curriculum, and I pondered how I could help. I decided to start a collaborative project, involving devotee parents from around the world. I formed an online group in which approximately 15 parents - from Australia, New Zealand, India, South Africa, the United Kingdom, and the United States - worked together to create study resources for each chapter of Canto 1. Every parent would send their creations to others in the group, who would use the material with their own children and offer feedback.

All the parents brought special skills - our team included English teachers, musicians, artists and computer professionals. With children of they own, they were highly motivated to give them a Bhagavatam-centered education. The result? An innovative collection of material on every chapter of Canto 1. The creators used the curriculum with their own children as they designed it, seeing the results firsthand.

However, having all this material in email attachments were beneficial only to a certain extent - it had to be edited, organized, and compiled. So we began the painstaking task of systematically compiling a book for use by parents and teachers anywhere, which was published as Srimad- Bhagavatam: A Comprehensive Guide for Young Readers, Canto 1. We then went through a similar process for Canto 2, Canto 3, and now Canto 4 with the help of our editor, Nikunja Vilasini Devi Dasi. This book is primarily geared for children between the ages of 9 and 16, but much of the material can be adapted for children younger than 9, or older than 16.

WHY STUDY SRIMAD-BHAGAVATAM?

Srila Prabhupada said that from the very beginning, children "should be taught Sanskrit and English, so in the future they can read our books. That will make them MA, Ph.D. Because the knowledge in these books is so advanced, children would be well-educated, happy, satisfied, and even go back home, back to Godhead." (Iagadisa, April 6, 1977)

As is evident in many of his Lectures, Srila Prabhupada desired that children in his gurukula schools read Srimad-Bhagavatam. In 1974, speaking on Srimad-Bhagavatam (1.16.22), Srila Prabhupada emphasized that the Bhagavatam would equip one to know any subject: "So in Srimad-Bhagavatam you will find everything, whatever is necessity, for the advancement of human civilization, everything is there described.

And knowledge also, all departments of knowledge, even astronomy, astrology, politics, sociology, atomic theory, everything is there.

Vidya-bhagavatduadhi. Therefore, if you study Srimad-Bhagavatam very carefully, then you get all knowledge completely. Because Bhagavatam begins from the point of creation: jammed assay yatah."

If we give children this foundation, they become confident of their spiritual identity and also do well academically. Srila Prabhupada books inspire critical reasoning and creative thinking, which are the main elements of academic education. In addition, Srimad- Bhagavatam is pure and perfect and can equip them with the highest knowledge, both material and spiritual.

Parents and teachers who have taught their children Srimad-Bhagavatam from their early lives have experienced how easily they pick up English language skills, especially reading, comprehension, and analytical reasoning. Srimad- Bhagavatam is full of analogies, allegories, figurative speech, and metaphors. Even a seven- year-old child can grasp difficult concepts because the subject matter of Srimad-Bhagavatam encourages higher-thinking skills.

Srimad-Bhagavatam is a wonderful book to teach from because it gives the philosophy of the Bhagavad-gita through stories, and children love stories. These stories are not fictitious; rather, they are the lives of great saintly personalities and the pastimes of Krsna and His auguries. By reading these, they directly associate with the great personalities and their teachings and begin to emulate the character of these personalities. As children grow older, they learn to appreciate the instructions given by Queen Kunti, Prahlada Maharaja, Dhruva Maharaja, Kapiladeva, and so many others. In fact, many of the devotees described in the Bhagavatam, such as Prahlada and Dhruva, are children themselves, so our children have perfect examples and heroes to follow.

Book's Contents and Sample Pages