"No books until twelve," Jean-Jacques Rousseau suggested in his seminal book Emile.  This might sound extreme, but I appreciate his message - childhood, nature, play first; the intellect comes later.

Unfortunately, the prevailing, underlying message of today's 'education' is - books as soon as possible.  Now Rousseau was not referring to children's story books, but to the foisting of abstract concepts and ideas on those too young to understand or appreciate such things.

Good examples of this are: the studying of algebra, which, to most children, is unrelated to anything real in their world.  Until I was 25 I thought that quadratic equations were fiendish devices invented specifically to punish school pupils. Likewise, the study of plays like King Lear and Hamlet.  To even begin to understand the issues in these plays takes quite a bit of living first.

Abstract ideas mostly confuse children and should be left for them to discover naturally or else introduced to when they reach adolescence and beyond.

All this is best illustrated by a story told to me in Australia by a man at a party.

This man had a daughter of 8, let's say Susan.  One Sunday morning the doorbell rang. Normally this man or his wife would open the door, but on this occasion Susan got to the door first.  This is the conversation he and his wife overheard:

Stranger:  Hullo, little girl.  Tell me, have you been saved?
Susan:  Yes, last month I was saved by a lifesaver at Avalon Beach.
Stranger:  No! No!  I mean have you been saved by Jesus?
Susan:   Which beach is he at?