Ziying Bei Ben Liu & Susan James Allan
​​​​​​​What is imagination for? How are imagination and idea connected? Listening to the children’s theories and musings, Susan and Bei Bei discover their own real questions and share them with the children, not to teach or evaluate, not simply to provoke the children’s thinking, but to think together with the children and each other about the essential human capacities of intellect and imagination. And this is how Bei Bei and Susan “step boldly into a new space together with children, to play with new possibilities and uncertainty, to accept different ideas, hear different stories, think and doubt together”. 
9781876138677
146 pages
Philosophically rich while being pragmatically thoughtful, these stories act in ways that provide optimism and inspiration for others … The idea of adults reclaiming the lost imagination of childhood is a powerful one; it resonates and will stay with the reader beyond the voices of these rich thinkers. There is open vulnerability in the authors’ sharing, alongside their discoveries with children. This book is both beautiful and provocative. I invite you to lose yourself in its invitations! — Alma Fleet, Honorary Associate Professor, Faculty of Arts  Macquarie University
Through wonderfully honest storytelling, the authors share how they transformed their understanding of the work and joy of teaching, retelling moments of children’s learning alongside their own lyrical reflections and wonderings. They powerfully draw us toward values that honour children’s voices, theories, brilliance, and the deep joy of meaningful inquiry. — Dr Gai Lindsay, Inquiry & Arty Play with Dr Gai
Living In The House of Imagination introduces the reader to two teachers ready to move into new territory, beyond their previous sense of what is possible to do in our work alongside children, carrying with them a backpack full of questions about what their work might entail if they were to trust in the limitless capacities that exist in the humans who make up a classroom. We have the privilege and delight of witnessing them moving to the edge of their understanding and what they think might be possible again and again — and each time they turn to the children and ask them to guide them forward. — Susan Harris MacKay and Matt Karlsen, The Center and Studio for Playful Inquiry
This is a book that exposes how easily we can “steal the sparks” from children’s learning lives, and then shows, with honesty and beauty, how we can instead become guardians of those sparks.