Germany is a world education power with nearly half of the Nobel Laureates, especially their humanistic and general education for young people, which has laid the foundation for minors' independent thinking and logical thinking ability, the ability to participate in social issues to express themselves, and the ability to analyze and adapt in the face of complex society.
Today's recommended set of "Humanistic General Books for Teenagers" is a general reading recommended by the German Federal Civic Education Institution, which leads young people over the age of 12 into the world of philosophy, world history and economics in the form of "micro-encyclopedia", understanding society and thinking about themselves.
In fact, there are many liberal arts books in China, but the vast majority of them are written for adults, just like the general education classes in schools, which often only appear in the curriculum of college students in the form of electives. However, a person has his own thinking system and establishes his own three views, starting from the teenage years, many education powers, such as britain, Germany, France, etc., are starting from middle school to set up humanities and general studies.
Teenagers go directly to read the humanistic general books written for adults, more or less will feel difficult, do not understand it simply do not read, so it is easy for children to lose interest in a subject.
The eye-catching point of this set of "Humanistic General Books for Teenagers" is that the authors of each volume not only have a professional learning background in the field, but also are senior young people's book writers, who are good at explaining abstract political and cultural concepts with life-like examples, so that teenagers feel interesting, intimate and readable. Even if the child has no previous understanding of philosophy, economics, and world history, reading this set of books will not feel that the threshold is too high and will be dissuaded by the difficulty.
What is more valuable is that although the book is a short article, the author is not throwing out one knowledge point after another in pieces, but can be summarized in a systematic way, the coverage is relatively complete, and the child learns more clearly.
1. Big thinking in small daily life, easy learning of serious subjects
The set consists of three volumes, divided into philosophy, world history, and economics.
The three major areas, in a concise but detailed way, comb through the development of the three classical disciplines from ancient times to the present, each chapter is a broad knowledge theme, and finally settled on the most noteworthy issues at present.
Economics fascicle, containing 4 chapters:
Spending and shopping
Work and income
Saving and investing
Economic policy and the world economy
It is not difficult to see that in the book of Economics, children can not only learn how to manage their own property, which is what we usually call "financial and business education", but also guide them to understand national economic policies and world economic trends. It may sound a bit macro, but we have to admit that whether it is a child's future career choices, financial investment or even independent entrepreneurship, it is inseparable from this ability to judge the situation.
The philosophical fascicle, with the chronological framework as the largest framework, began with the Greeks inventing the word "philosophy" 2700 years ago, and went all the way to the current era of science and technology, thinking about the ethical disputes caused by cloning.
The book covers the most important themes in the history of philosophy:
Existence, wisdom, reason, nature, humanity, faith, morality, freedom, rights, logic, ethics, gender...
Scared by these big words? Don't worry, the author has already set up a "ladder" for children to enter the door of philosophy.
This is how Hegel's dialectic is introduced in the book—
An aunt said, "You look so much like your dad!" ”
Another aunt retorted, "No! You and your mother just called a mold carved out! ”
You are secretly angry in your heart: "Can't I just be myself?" ”
Probably every child has heard this kind of conversation. Seemingly inconspicuous household words contain dialectical ideas. The author then explains —
Hegel believed that the birth of everything in the world has similarities with the way humans conceive the next generation, and the key point is that two opposites (male and female) exist in contradiction and together create new products (newborns).
Another example is to guide children to think about the difference between knowledge and wisdom -
Suppose your uncle is a scientist and the pride of the whole family. But you don't like to listen to him, and instead prefer to talk to your grandmother. Grandma never went to college, but she had her own wisdom in life.
In the "History of the World" fascicle, the author chooses to tell history with stories, focusing on recreating a scene, an event, or a character, rather than generalizing and not clearly describing the entire course of history.
For example, Frederick II was a representative of the "enlightened absolutist" monarchs in Europe, how does this appear in the book? Instead of listing his political achievements alone, a vivid detail is given:
Although later generations revered him frederick the Great, he was the "Old Fritz" to his subordinates.
From this title, it is not difficult to see that Frederick II was a very down-to-earth monarch.
2, feel free to read can also get the knowledge system
As a set of easy introductory books for serious disciplines such as philosophy, economics, and history, this set of books has a systematic knowledge structure, but does not make this huge knowledge system a burden for teenagers to read. Young readers can either read through the whole discipline in order from beginning to end, grasping the overall structure of a discipline; they can also flip through at will, focusing on the germination of interest, and reading which page they want to read.
The sidebar of the page will have an extended introduction of relevant knowledge, including proper noun interpretation, celebrity quotes, knowledge point summary, detail supplementation, and give a page number index. Therefore, even if the child just flips through the pages at random, he can naturally connect the connected knowledge points in the reading.
For example, there is a chapter in philosophy about Francis Bacon, who is the one who utters the famous phrase "knowledge is power." The child flipped through here and looked at it, hey, this sentence is quite familiar, see how the author wrote it. He would read philosophical concepts such as "empiricism" and "cave fables" in the main text and sidebar, as well as Aristotle's admiration for logical reasoning.
Seeing this, the child naturally wants to know, what do these concepts mean? Don't worry, the book is marked with a clear page number, as long as you follow the author's prompts, you can smooth down the knowledge that is related to each other.
If you want to read a little deeper and draw a mind map, then these reading tips given by the author are the most to-the-point assistance, allowing children to quickly establish their own knowledge map.
Each volume also provides a list of characters, memorabilia or glossaries in the final appendix section, which refines the knowledge points of the whole book and gives children a complete cognitive map of the subject.
3. It is not only oriented to the future, but also helps middle school students to learn at present
In the future era of artificial intelligence, many occupations are facing the danger of being replaced by machines, and what will not be replaced is a new concept, new model, and new method based on a person's unique thinking. This set of books aims to cultivate young people's ability to explore the world, think about their own independent thinking, and analyze and adapt to complex social issues, which is the core of the most competitive ability in the future.
In addition to cultivating these future-oriented abilities, this set of books can also help children's school learning at the secondary school level.
Philosophy can help children come up with unique perspectives when writing essays, and these ideas are convincingly endorsed by philosophical masters.
For example, the composition materials of the 2021 National New College Entrance Examination Volume I point out that strength and weakness are not innate and fixed, but are closely related to people's choices and actions the day after tomorrow. This fits some of the existentialist views: people are forced to be born into this world, but everyone can become the helmsman of their own life, from "passive existence" to "active existence". If you add some such philosophical reflections and famous quotes to your essay, are you still worried that you can't stand out among the candidates?
This year's college entrance examination language involves topics such as: can be and have a future, time and value, ideals and self-realization... These topics can give a philosophically deep response, and this book can provide guidance.
The "History of the World" volume is an appropriate extension of the historical knowledge learned by children in secondary school textbooks, supplemented with more vivid details. For example, when introducing Queen Victoria, she not only mentions that the era under her rule was the heyday of the British Empire, but also from her title of "grandmother of Europe", where the dizzying kinship between the royal families of European countries came from, and also explains what style the "Victorian" common in literary works refers to.
Compared with some books that focus on the cultivation of children's financial quotients, the sub-rules of "Economics" are larger, not only concerned with how to earn money, save money, save money and avoid being deceived, but also how individuals understand the country's economic policies and global economic trends. High school politics, history, geography and other disciplines are inseparable from the knowledge of economics.
4. Easy to read, fun and good-looking humanistic general knowledge books
Recommended book for german federal civic education institutions
Nominated for the Gustav Heinemann Children's Book Peace Prize
A popular and popular general reading of the German Enlightenment
Help teenagers over the age of 12 to explore the world and think about themselves
It is also suitable for adults who maintain a curious and truth-seeking attitude
One topic per page or two pages, short and concise, highlighted with key golden sentences, so that children can easily grasp the main points.
The sidebar has a detailed explanation of professional terms and concepts, as well as famous quotes on related topics to expand the knowledge.
Each book has an appendix, which is a list of characters, memorabilia and vocabulary, which extracts the knowledge points of the whole book and gives the child a cognitive map of the subject.
Spot color printing, blue, green, orange three theme colors are fresh and bright, in line with the reading habits of young readers.
Each of the three fascicles has hundreds of hand-drawn illustrations to increase reading pleasure and help understand the content.
Double cover, protective cover + inner cover, easy to read, but also better protection of the book.
This set of books can combine serious humanistic knowledge with the daily life of teenagers so naturally and interestingly, not only children like to read, but adults can also read with relish!
3 volumes of general humanities books for teenagers (philosophy, world history, economics) ¥79 purchase