In the children's section of the bookstore, a mother is looking for a book for her five-or six-year-old child. The little girl is enthralled with the colorful storybook she is reading, but her mother is busily searching the shelves for a book that will be "good" for her. Finally, heedless of her daughter's look of disappointment, the mother confidently buys her a complete set of The Child's Encyclopedia.

Caught in grownups' clutches: "Financial prosperity means that parents are even more eager to invest in their kids," says Huang Lun-fen, vice director of the Yu Yuan Foundation. All kinds of businesses related to children--from children's books and designer clothes to art and music classes and parent-child tour groups--are booming, she says. But the production, marketing and purchasing of all these items are controlled by adults, and the needs and preferences of children are rarely given much weight.

According to a report prepared by the Shin Yi Foundation for the Council for Cultural Planning and Development called "A Study of the Sale and Consumption of Children's Reading Matter," book buying is one expense item that parents are happy to pay for and give priority attention to. About half of all parents take children to buy books, but in over 70 percent of the cases the one who decides whether or not to buy a book and which book to buy is the parent.

This study also showed that what children like best are stories and fairy tales, but that what mothers usually buy are "educationally significant" books like preschool readers and primers on science, botany, zoology and similar subjects.

In the choice of toys, modern-day parents tend to plump for educational or "IQ-building" toys. Building blocks, jigsaw puzzles and Lego can be found in almost every family home, and toy guns, Barbie dolls and toy cellular phones, which imitate the world of grownups, are equally ubiquitous.

Don't give kids "standard solutions": Is taking away a child's freedom of choice fair? Just what do children truly need or want?

Chang Shih-tzung, who has a Ph.D. in education from Columbia University and has engaged in toy design and research for a number of years, says that so-called "educational" toys are not necessarily good toys since toys that are too difficult or complicated will cause the child to feel frustrated or timid. "Good toys should be simple," he says, "with lots of room for participation, and not amenable to only one solution."

Comparing jigsaw puzzles against traditional Chinese tangrams, he explains that tangrams leave more room for creativity and imagination. " Jigsaw puzzles have anywhere from several dozens of pieces to over a thousand, but there's only one standard solution in the end, and if you miss a step along the way, it won't work. But with tangrams there's no standard solution. With just seven pieces, you can produce an endless variety of shapes."

Imagination and creativity are two of the most precious things children have. Yet the author Hsiao Yeh believes that current educational methods are not only poor at stimulating them but actually kill them off.

Viewing the world from 100cm high: To cater to adult preferences, some abnormal phenomena have appeared in the children's book market. Hao Kuang-tsai, who used to be editor in chief of children's publishing at Yuan-Liou Publishing Co., points out that according to last year's statistics there are around 3,700 book publishers on Taiwan, offering some 20,000 different titles, of which more than 400 are for children. In terms of quantity, these figures are rather low, and most of the books are rehashes of traditional customs, folk tales and festivals or translations of foreign books on science or other subjects. Less than 20 percent are locally produced works of creative fiction. "Compared with the proportion for other countries, which is about 80 percent, that's way too low," he says.

To write for children, you have to have the heart and eyes of a child -- you have to see things through their eyes. Where should adults, like the grown-up Peter Pan in the movie Hook, go to find them? Writers and illustrators, in particular, must always keep in mind, "Just what do children like?"

"Children must be respected," Chang says. "Adults should bend over and look at the world from a child's perspective." He says a foreign TV program once filmed the way things appear through a camera set at 100 centimeters high. Adults who saw the show were surprised at how different the world must look to children.

A toy store on 57th Street in New York has a special little door for children next to its main entrance. Some people might think that's superfluous, but Chang is touched by the owner's intentions. "It's an expression of affirming children, thinking of them and respecting them."

In terms of method, some people turn to their own children to help them recover the heart of a child. Hsiao Yeh's Fairy Tales is a prime example.

Finding the lost heart of a child: Hsiao Yeh's children, like Hsiao himself, spent their child hood being told stories by their mother, and they helped him piece together stories and pictures into Hsiao Yeh's Fairy T ales, The Lazy Men Among the Trees, Starman and other imaginative books. They aren't primers that tell children to study hard, be diligent and obey their parents. "I just wanted to stimulate their imagination," he says.

Other people use memory and flashbacks to try to bring their childhoods back to life.

Wang Chin-hsuan, the author of Red Turtle Cake, which won the Golden Dragon Award for excellent children's books and was named one of the 10 best books of the year by the China Times, used just that method to write the first series of children's songbooks in the Taiwanese dialect. The source of his inspiration was memories of his childhood and that of his neighbors growing up in the countryside.

He pedals on the left/and he pedals on the right/but the seat's too high/and he can't sit tight. One lively song describes how the little boy next door, who rode a bicycle that was too big for him, would circle around the yard every time he came back from a ride, crying: "Daddy! Daddy! Help me, I can't stop!"

　Stuck at the starting line: The musician Chu Tzung-ching experiments with his children by playing pieces he has composed for them first to what see their reaction is. Primary musical education, he believes, is often understood too narrowly as teaching children to play an instrument, which then becomes a heavy burden on them. He feels that's wrong: "Letting children come into contact with music in their daily lives and enjoy it is the only right way to go about it. If you're too demanding, children will feel pressure and end up stuck at the starting line."

Five years ago, feeling that children's music didn't receive enough attention and was widely misunderstood, Chu held his first children's music concert to let children come into contact with music, enjoy it and go on to take part in it. Besides playing children's songs for them, Chu let the children come on stage to sing, conduct and play percussion. This year he has come up with a new version of guess-fingers that children can play in time with the beat.

Chu runs a musical training center, only here the children begin with singing and game playing, like listening to the sounds of struck stones, a whistling teakettle or a flushing toilet to experience all kinds of natural notes and rhythms. Another of the center's special features is "class visitors not allowed."

When parents can't see what's going on, they always wonder, "What in the world are the children learning now?" or "Why is it so noisy?" Chu smiles: "I don't let the parents know what the children are learning, or else they'd make them practice it over and over when they go home. And when the teacher lets the children play around with the instruments, of course it's noisy. I'd be worried if it wasn't!"

The line between fun and pressure: In the view of these creators for children, books, music and toys should all be a source of fun and happiness to children, providing them with room for thinking and imagination. "Adults shouldn't turn these sources of fun into sources of pressure, forcing the child out of childhood," Chu says, speaking for them all.

Children's theater, which has been on the rise in recent years, is aimed at letting children enjoy stage performances in a fun and joyful atmosphere, too.

Li Yung-feng, artistic director of the Mokit Children's Theater, says that the purpose of children's theater is not to teach children about the routines of life like table manners and what to wear. "Children are very strong in creativity and imagination. We shouldn't view them as too simple," he says.

The company's most popular piece, A Cheerful Chinese Festival, for instance, has no dialogue, but it creates a fun and joyous atmosphere with colorful ribbons, changing lights and upbeat music. "Children have a hard time sitting still, but every time we put on this piece, the children are so wrapped up in it you won't hear a peep out of them," Li says. "Quiet like that is something you don't need adults to control. It's the result of concentration."

Seeking possibilities: Striving to improve Chinese toys and make them suitable for modern-day children, Chang Shih-tzung will launch a new series of innovative toys that he has spent many years researching at the end of this year. Hsiao Yeh has come out with ten volumes of children's stories so far and plans to keep at it. The Mokit Taiwan Children's Theater will put on its biggest show of the year--Return to the Mokit House--at the National Theater in late March and early April. And Chu Tzung -ching will take his children's concert Carnival of the Animals on an all-island tour. . . .

All these efforts by adults to bring children fun and happiness regardless of "educational content" are alike in seeking a possibility--the possibility of putting the child back in childhood. In fact, only if adult s can find the heart of the child within them will children have a chance to be cute little kids again.

[Picture Caption]

You're only as old as you feel, so why not get down and play with the kids? This is a family playroom at the Shin Yi Foundation.

Chang Shih-tzung believes that traditional toys may make adults feel nostalgic, but if you want them to be accepted by modern-day children, they have to be renovated and changed around.

Chu Tzung-ching maintains that music should be learned through play and daily life.

Besides its "educational" value, reading books together can bring parents closer to their children.

The play 'How Can I Wrap My Oranges?' illustrates a serious issue--environmental protection--in a funny way and gives children food for thought in addition to laughs. Shown here is a rehearsal of the Mokit Taiwan Children's Theater.

Chang Shih-tzung believes that traditional toys may make adults feel nostalgic, but if you want them to be accepted by modern-day children, they have to be renovated and changed around.

Chu Tzung-ching maintains that music should be learned through play and daily life.

Besides its "educational" value, reading books together can bring parents closer to their children.

The play 'How Can I Wrap My Oranges?' illustrates a serious issue--environmental protection--in a funny way and gives children food for thought in addition to laughs. Shown here is a rehearsal of the Mokit Taiwan Children's Theater.